Fascinating netball tourney again

After a successful completion of the Second 'Sri Lanka Sports.com' Netball Challenge -Inter company Netball Championship , SportsLine Marketing (pvt) Limited is planning to hold yet another fascinating tournament for the year 2008 for the third consecutive year on 29th and 30th November 2008 at the National Youth Center Indoor Stadium, Maharagama.

Sri Lankasports.com Netball Challenge is Co-Sponsored by Finance & Guarantee Group for the second consecutive year.

"Sri Lanka Sports Netball Challenge" will be played once again on the innovative format introduced by the SportsLine Marketing (Pvt) Limited. The tournament will be played for Cup/Plate/Bowl and Shield Championships . It will give more opportunities for experienced and up and coming teams to show their talents and compete in equal manner.

16 top teams representing prestigious companies in Sri Lanka expect to take part in this tournament in four groups and have the Blessing of the Netball Federation of Sri Lanka. The 16 teams who have forwarded the entries has been grouped in to four pools of four.

Group A -Nations Trust Bank/Standard Chartered Bank/Plenty Foods (pvt) Ltd/HSBC

Group B -PABC Bank/Seylan Bank/Access International/Janashakthi Insurance

Group C - Star Garments/Sri Lanka Insurance/Commercial Bank/Soft Logic

Group D - Mobitel/Ceylon Biscuits/Ceylinco Group/David Peries Motor Co.

The tournament will begin at 8.a.m on both days (29th and 30th November) and the finals of the Shield/Bowl/Plate and Cup Championships will commence from 1.45 pm onwards on the last day 30th November.

Academy of Netball-Kotte headed by Ms Thilaka Jinadasa will provide the technical assistance for this tournament while Former Director of National Institute of Sports Science, Mr Yogananda Wijesundara will be the Tournament referee for the event.

Seylan Bank prevented Hatton National Bank to retain the Sri Lankasports.com Netball Challenge for the second consecutive year when they beat the defending Champions by 39 goals to 26 at the evenly contested finals of the Cup Championship.

Commercial Bank won the plate championship beating Nations Trust Bank 13 goals to 1 in the Plate Championships. Janashakthi Insurance took away the Bowl championship after beating new comers Soft Logic in the bowl final by 4 goals to 3 in the finals. All players received a certificate of participation.

Sri Lankasports.com Netball Challenge commenced in the year 2006 being the first ever Netball tournament played with the format of 'rugby sevens' in Sri Lanka. It has acclaimed as one of the best Netball Tournaments staged in Sri Lanka and the 2007 event went in to history as the first ever inter company netball tournament completely conducted in an indoor stadium.

"Sri Lanka Sports Netball Challenge is the only inter company netball tournament at present.