Tobago House of Assembly (THA) will be the lone new team entered when the 25th edition of the Courts All Sectors Netball League will celebrate 25 years this year. The Opening Ceremony will take place at the Eastern Regional Indoor Sports Arena, Orange Grove Road, Tacarigua today (Saturday) from 3pm.
The THA women are expected to be on show from 3pm when the parade of teams get going with the help of music from the Fire Service Band. Overall, 19 teams will participate in this season’s competitions, four in the Premier Division; five in the Championship Division; six in the Alternative and four in the Retro.
THA will compete in the Premier Division with defending league champions Fire Service, Police and University of T&T. Police is expected to be the main threat to Fire’s crown having won the Opening Day knockout, Steve Sarjeant Challenge, Divisional Knockout and Fast 5 competitions while UTT returns at the expense of Game Changers.
In the Championship Division, Fire Service double crowned champions will face stiff competition from Opening Day knockout title holder, San Juan Jabloteh, Police X, the reigning Jean Pierre Challenge and Fast 5 winners, Police Y, and Bermudez. And in the Alternative Division, defending league and knokcout winners UTT comes up against divisional knockout winners’ TSTT, Police, Fast 5 champions Prisons, University of the Southern Caribbean (USC) and Fideas, which makes a return after a three-year hiatus.
The Retro Division, the teams are Bermudez, Les Enfants, TSTT, and Harlem. Following the March Past, spectators will witness the Opening Day Knock out Competition in the Premiership, the Championship and the Alternative Divisions. During the season, all teams will play two rounds of competition for the League trophies. The major knockout Competitions include the Jean Pierre Challenge trophy and the Steve Sarjeant Challenge trophy. Both Pierre, and Sarjeant, who are deceased, were two of the six founding members of the League in 1991
The League will again feature the FAST 5 as another competition in each Division, and the Courts Open Knockout to which all teams are invited. Fast 5 is the shorter version of the game launched by the International Federation of Netball Associations in Manchester City, England in October 2009.