Mid Canterbury Netball’s ACL Premier 1 competition will feature an extra 20 minutes of game time each week this season.

Mid Canterbury Netball is introducing hour-long games to its top grade, which – for players – will be a massive step up from the 4x 10 minute quarters they’re used to.

Centre manager Erin Tasker said it’s a change that clubs have been pushing for in recent years the board had decided it was time for the longer games.

It’s means the Thursday night premier competition will look different this year in order to fit all of the games in she said.

“We’re going to have to start a bit earlier, and while we’ve been lucky up to now that we’ve been able to set aside one court as a warm up court for all teams, this year we’re going to need to use that court for games,” Tasker said.

“Things are going to look a little less uniform this year – games won’t all be starting at the same time, and there’s going to be a lot more movement throughout the night.

“It’s a bit tight fitting three grades onto only four courts, so we’re going to have staggered timings for games starting, but we’ve managed to come up with a plan on paper that ensures that all teams still have the opportunity to warm up on court, which is important for player welfare.”

The move to hour-long games in ACL Premier 1 is the main change this, with a couple of notable changes in other grades Tasker said.

In the senior youth competition on a Saturday afternoon, a new mixed grade is being introduced to cater for the growing number of boys playing netball, while in the Wednesday night social competition the minimum age has been raised from year 11, to age 18 and over.

Tasker said this is to try and bring the social competition back to what it was originally intended to be – a social competition for adults.

The senior youth competition caters to young people up to the age of 21. In the mixed grade, boys can play up to and including the age of 18, while in all other grades the maximum age for boys remains at 14.