Walking netball is a version of
netball
Netball is a ball sport played on a rectangular court by two teams of seven players. The primary objective is to shoot a ball through the defender's goal ring while preventing the opposing team from shooting through their own. It is one of a ...
adapted to be a slower game and thus more inclusive, allowing older or less fit people to continue playing, return to playing, or take up netball for the first time.
The main differences in the rules are that running and jumping are not allowed, that an extra step may be taken with the ball, and that the ball may be held for 4 seconds instead of 3 seconds.
A walking netball programme was first developed in England in 2017, as a collaboration between
England Netball and the charity
Age UK.
It is played in countries including England,
Australia
and New Zealand.
A 2021 research paper, reporting on a project involving introducing members of the
Women's Institute
The Women's Institute (WI) is a community-based organization for women in the United Kingdom, Canada, South Africa and New Zealand. The movement was founded in Stoney Creek, Ontario, Canada, by Erland and Janet Lee with Adelaide Hoodless being the ...
in England to the game, found walking netball to be "an acceptable, feasible and effective intervention to increase physical activity and improve health in middle- to older- aged women".
Similar slower-paced sports include
walking football
Walking football is a variant of association football invented in 2011 and is played by thousands of teams all over the UK.
Overview
It is aimed at keeping people aged over 50 involved with football if, due to a lack of mobility or for other re ...
(association football),
,
.
(based on
field hockey
Field hockey (or simply referred to as hockey in some countries where ice hockey is not popular) is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with 11 players in total, made up of 10 field players and a goalk ...
)
and
walking cricket.
References
Netball variants
Walking
Senior sport
Women's sports
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