On 12 and 13 April 2008, the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) organised a netball tournament in conjunction with the annually held Vice Chancellor Cup. The tournament, divided into women’s and men’s categories, saw participation from 10 men’s teams.
Matches were played on grass amidst hot and humid weather.
Preliminary Round
The men’s teams were divided into 3 groups and here are the results for preliminary round:
The top 2 teams qualified to the next round.
Final round
The weather turned bad soon after the preliminary round was completed, turning the fields into mud patches. Of course, that deterred the teams not one bit.
The teams were redrawn into 2 new groups where the top 2 teams will compete in the finals for the first and second placings. Since the third and fourth prizes were the same, no play-off will be carried out and placings will be determined by points.
Here are the results for the final round:
After calculating the points, third place was won by Royale B and fourth was Sonique. However, Royale B was disqualified for breaking the rules by fielding players who were not in the name list. As such, Sonique got third place and fourth was awarded to team Goujers.
The play-off for first and second place was between teams Legend and Royale A. Played on a fresh field, team Royale A soundly beat team Legend, 15-9. Congratulations to team Royale A. They won trophy, medals and cash RM1,000. The Best Player title for men’s category was awarded to Firdaus from team Royale A. Team Legend won medals and cash RM750, and they also bagged the Fair Play award.
Only 7 teams participated — considerably less than last year’s NPNG Open games. Maybe the players of the other teams were not able to play, so they couldn’t send their teams in. And also maybe because the entrance fee was too high (RM120 per team) while the prize money was quite small (RM300 for first place, plus medals, t-shirts and a voucher).
The 7 teams were Sonique, D’X Team, Legend, Cobra, Royale A, Royale B and MAS Engineering. The game format was 7-1-7 (7-minute play for the first half, break for 1 minute, then another 7-minute play for the second half) and was played league-style. So everybody got the chance to play everybody.
Here’s the results of the matches:
Final overall standings:
- Royale A
- Legend
- Royale B
- Sonique
- MAS Engineering
- Cobra
- D’X Team
Highlights of the tournament:
- Team Cobra beat team Royale B by 2 points. (Congratulations, guys!)
- During the game between Legend and Royale A, a player of team Royale A was temporarily sent out of court due to aggressive play and excessive questioning of the referees’ calls. (That should be a lesson to remember.)
Congratulations to team Royale A for winning the tournament. As for the photos, well… I was too busy playing that I didn’t have time to shoot them. Okay, to be honest, I was too lazy. 
As for me, this was the second NPNG Open tournament I’ve participated in. The first one was my first appearance ever in a netball tournament. I was quite nervous the whole 7 minutes I was on court. Hehehehe… But this time there was no such thing anymore. In the preliminary rounds, we beat teams PNB 22-0, Royale B 12-9 and MAS Engineering 6-4. Quite a shocker, that one. 6-4? Definitely not Legend-like.
We met Sonique in the semi and beat them 14-7. In the final, we met Royale A and was beaten 14-13. Congratulations to Royale A. It was a really really good game and I enjoyed it very much.
My family was still shopping when I got home, so I just rested till they returned, which was around 8 pm. Tonight’s plan was dinner at Eina’s. She agreed to cook for us, even though she originally wanted to taste my mom’s cooking. Ah well… maybe next time. Hehehehe…
My parents went home after dinner (too tired to do anything else) while my brother and I went to the KL Downtown for another session of foot massage