The coronavirus has claimed another sporting casualty, the Netball Mainland Zone is to go into voluntary liquidation.
Netball Mainland are the governing body for the upper South Island, represented by the Mainland Tactix in the ANZ Premiership.
As Netball Mainland today held their annual general meeting, members have accepted the recommendation to liquidate, with netball currently indefinitely suspended due to the ongoing effects of Covid-19.
"There has been a massive amount of work by the Netball Mainland Board and staff to get the organisation into a positive position in 2020. However, with the financial impact of Covid-19 Netball Mainland could not continue," spokesperson Darren Wright said in a statement today.
"It was a very difficult decision for Netball Mainland but after undertaking a thorough review of its financial position and regrettably with there being no certainty as to when both community and high performance games will resume, the difficult decision has been made to liquidate.
"Before making this decision, Netball Mainland explored a number of potential alternatives, including Netball New Zealand, but none were able to help in the current environment.
"Whilst understanding the position of Netball New Zealand, we are extremely disappointed to have to make this call, particularly with this being such devastating news for our Centres, staff and team."
Netball New Zealand have moved to assure that they will move to ensure the management of netball in the upper South Island.
"Our hearts go out to the Mainland Board and their staff, Netball NZ will now work through a process of how the ongoing management and servicing of the game will work," Netball New Zealand CEO Jennie Wylie says.
"These are challenging times and businesses are having to re-think their structures for both now and the future. We know our Netball Centres are well placed to maintain our community game and we will be working with them to ensure the future of local netball.
"We would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the incredibly hard work that the Board of Netball Mainland have put in over the past 18 months to restructure the Mainland Zone and we are gutted that the great strides being made in the Zone will now not have the time to come to fruition."
The liquidation will be ratified in 30 working days' time, when officials meet again.
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