Cheludu leaves for trials in Australia

 

Botswana netball player Cheledo Davids who was identified during the 2017 Netball World Youth Cup (NWYC) games is going for trials in Australia. According to Botswana Netball Association (BONA) president, Malebo Raditladi, Davids was invited by Woods Panthers netball club coach, Judi Andrewartha,  to join the premier league squad. The team is based in Adelaide in South Australia.

The Australia trials, she said, comes as a follow-up  to an invitation that was sent after the Dinaletsana trip to Australia where they identified Fatima Dino, Kgomotso Matibini and Davids as top cream. At the time, the request was that the identified players would play and school in Australia but BONA failed to acquire scholarships for the players and the deal somehow fell off.

“Early this year, they sent a request now focussing on Cheledo alone. And it has been a mission to ensuring  she arrives there but other than that, the team that has been behind this initiative headed by Our former president Tebogo Lebotse-sebego together with Dr. Keba Hulela and Lorato Thebekgosi has managed and Cheludo  is scheduled to leave on the 8th June 2019,” Raditladi said.

She added that Davids will be in Australia for only 4 months as the other 2 months were wasted while trying to acquire funding for her travel to Australia. The BONA president assured that the offer letter that was shared with BONA states that the player will be in a very high performance training where her suitability and contentment will be assessed and when all parties are satisfied with her, then an extension of her contract and term will be considered. She mentioned that David’s welfare will be taken care of by the Australia team.

Raditladi expressed confidence that Davids is a talented player and believes she will do well out there.  “I believe she will be able to adapt to the elite training  which  might be a bit of a challenge for her as she is not used to that high level training but we believe if she sees others doing it and managing, she will also push herself to be better,” she said.

She noted that at BONA, they wish  to see more  players going overseas as opportunities like that could enable players to make a living from their talent. They remain hopeful that SriLanka and Singapore will soon come knocking, searching for talent as well.