On 18/19 March, five members of Southerners Netballers (Kerry Guthrie, Alex Alo, Mel Luck, Seonaid Anderson, and Nicole Stanners) played in the Hong Kong Inter Asian Netball Tournament under the Bangkok Netball League Banner. Teams were from Hong Kong and Singapore, traditionally the more competitive Expatriate teams in Asia.
The team played well considering it was a throw together teamthat had never played together before. Unfortunately that was our downfall, as the team we played first up, Hong Kong Retrievers, won our pool and we only lost to them by 2 points. We then warmed up very well, won our next game against Singapore, had a draw on the whistle against the Hong Kong Under 21s and then won our last game against Hong Kong Valley Club, who are always a strong competitor. So we ended up coming 3rd in our pool, but thin we would have challenged a good game in the finals, had we won through. All in all a good effort and some fast paced games which made for a refreshing change for Southerners A, who are top of the comp in BNL.
Post the games we retired to the Hong Kong Football Club Bar for a few beers and to watch some rugby being played on the field, a spot of shopping and then prepare to go out. Hong Kong Netball had organised some ‘Western Chinese” for all the teams and some happy hour drinks at a new bar. After several margaritas we were dragged away by our previous Hong Kong locals, Kerry and Seonaid in search of a better bar and a few of the 6000 Firemen who had descended Hong Kong for The Firemen’s Olympics. We ended up at Carnegies, famous for Bar Dancing and full of English and Dutch Firemen. By the end of the night, we had danced on the bar, even the most reluctant, lost our voices from too much singing and passive smoking and entertained some of the Firemen – some more than others! Sunday was a very slow day….
