Dead­line for the World Net­ball Youth Cup Qual­i­fiers for Un­der-21 play­ers has been ex­tend­ed due to COVID-19.

In a re­lease sent out by the T&T Net­ball As­so­ci­a­tion (TTNA) pres­i­dent Dr Pa­tri­cia Butch­er on Thurs­day, shar­ing guid­ance from the head body, the In­ter­na­tion­al Net­ball Fed­er­a­tion (INF).

"This is tru­ly an un­prece­dent­ed time in world his­to­ry and like you, I have been lis­ten­ing on a dai­ly ba­sis to our lead­ers of gov­ern­ment and mon­i­tor­ing what is tak­ing place around the world dur­ing this glob­al pan­dem­ic.

"We have now re­ceived a mis­sive from the INF Pres­i­dent, Liz Nicholls and it is of­fi­cial that the dead­line for the Qual­i­fiers for the World Net­ball Youth Cup for U-21 play­ers has been ex­tend­ed un­til Oc­to­ber 31, 2020. Oth­er sport­ing bod­ies are tak­ing the nec­es­sary pre­cau­tions and events are be­ing post­poned as well."

Butch­er, like oth­er sport­ing heads, are tak­ing heed of the urg­ing by the Min­istry of Health to prac­tise so­cial dis­tanc­ing to slow the spread of the virus which can have dele­te­ri­ous ef­fects es­pe­cial­ly for per­sons over 60 years.

"No one but our Cre­ator can de­ter­mine when this pan­dem­ic will end," said Butch­er in the re­lease adding that she has been keep­ing abreast of in­for­ma­tion about T&T's three pro­fes­sion­al play­ers over­seas.

."My heart reach­es out to the three pro­fes­sion­al play­ers who are abroad at this time. I have reached out to Daystar Swift (New Zealand) and Saman­tha Wal­lace (Aus­tralia) via What­sApp. I have al­so spo­ken to Khal­i­fa Mc Collin's(New Zealand) moth­er, Althea, to en­quire about her wel­fare, par­tic­u­lar­ly, at this time.

"Daystar and Khal­i­fa are man­ag­ing well and mak­ing every ef­fort to stay safe. In­di­rect­ly, I have been as­sured that Saman­tha is do­ing her best to cope at this dif­fi­cult time. De­spite her best ef­forts, she would not have been able to re­turn home be­fore the clos­ing of the bor­ders by our gov­ern­ment.

"In sit­u­a­tions like these when we have no con­trol my sim­ple mantra is 'Let Go and Let God '. This is a time for se­ri­ous re­flec­tion and med­i­ta­tion. No one knows the day or the hour when our Cre­ator will call us back from this earth. My ad­vice there­fore is to take care of our­selves, our fam­i­lies and our loved ones and heed the guid­ance of our lead­ers con­cern­ing this virus."

She went on to ad­vise all coach­es in­clud­ing U-21's coach­ing staff Althea Mc­Collin and Kem­ba Dun­can to stay in touch with their charges and pro­vide them with guid­ance and sup­port so that they can re­main fit and healthy pend­ing the re­vised dates for the var­i­ous tour­na­ments. Ear­li­er this month, the TTNA halt­ed train­ing of all na­tion­al teams and all net­ball re­lat­ed ac­tiv­i­ties.

"I will be keep­ing in­formed with our gov­ern­ment ́s ad­vi­sories and in­for­ma­tion from the INF and AF­NA and our Sec­re­tary will ad­vise of any changes and/or de­vel­op­ments dur­ing this dif­fi­cult pe­ri­od. Stay safe and may the Lord bless and keep all of us dur­ing these dif­fi­cult times," said Butch­er.