ONGOING wet weather has left Bathurst Netball Association with a slippery problem.
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The association’s 1300 players call the John Matthews Netball Complex home, but the courts are a safety risk each time it rains, according to association president Catherine Welch.
Late Friday she had her eyes on the sky still hopeful that the rain would ease off for Saturday’s games.
“We’re all nervously watching to see what tomorrow’s [Saturday] weather will be,” she said.
“If play gets cancelled we will have only played one game in eight weeks. I think this is the worst season for being rained out.”
Ms Welch said that each time it rains the complex’s 14 courts, which are supposed to be all-weather courts, become slippery.
“That’s why we call it off – because it’s slippery, not because we don’t want to get wet,” she said.
With no indoor netball complex in the city, Ms Welch said options are limited to allow players to play their games.
The Bathurst Indoor Sports Stadium is sometimes used but is not always available at late notice and it is significantly smaller than the John Matthews Netball Complex.
“The problem is we go from 14 courts to four and the only way to do that is to reduce it from an hour to a half-hour for each game,” Ms Welch said.
“Then the Netta Grade [non-competitive eight to nine-year-olds] can’t play.”
Ms Welch said rained-out games and a lack of an appropriate indoor stadium leave players and the association frustrated.
“It’s a hard call to make and I take full responsibility ... yes, it’s frustrating and it’s not great, but safety is the highest priority,” she said.
“There’s no capacity to make up those games ... it can have a significant impact on the ladder.
“In a perfect world we’d have an indoor stadium like Orange.”
Meanwhile, Chifley Local Area Command Inspector David Abercrombie has urged motorists to drive to the conditions with frost and snow predicted around some parts of the region.
He asked people not to call Bathurst Police Station to check road conditions, but to refer to the Live Traffic smartphone app or online at www.livetraffic.com.