BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, CMC – International umpire Marion Johnson-Hurley said lack of opportunity leading to frustration has taken its toll and she could soon step down from the position.
The Barbadian umpire said in an article with the Nation newspaper that she wanted to see more fairness in the selection of umpires for international tournaments.
“They pick people for name’s sake, not the ones who are umpiring the best,” she told the newspaper.
“You are going out there and because of your name or your country, you get to do games.”
She added: “It’s not easy coming from the Caribbean to umpire. [If] you don’t have anyone there to push you that is where our problem is.
“We don’t have any help like how they have people on the panel that will put people in place whether they are doing well or not.”
Johnson-Hurley said she was also against the new standard of fitness which the International Federation of Netball Associations has employed.
“Getting extremely fit as an umpire is only part of it,” she said. “The problem I am encountering is that we are trying to get the umpires so fit, that we are not concentrating on what is important – the rules of the game.
“That is basically my concern with the fitness, but the fitness is not really the problem. The problem is that we are running fast and missing a lot of calls.”
Johnson-Hurley said she would continue to plod away due to the lack of international umpires in the region. There are only seven at the moment with four based in Jamaica and the other two in Trinidad & Tobago.
“I am holding on because we don’t have anything down here,” she said. “If I decide to quit, what am I doing? It is going to get even worse because they are not really sending up anyone from down here.
“As soon as I can see the doors opening to get more regional umpires from Caribbean, America, Canada – that is [the] only way I can leave.”
Johnson-Hurley has officiated some of netballs’ biggest games since being elevated to the international panel 13 years ago.
She carried the Finals of the 2003 World Championships in Jamaica, the 2005 World Youth Netball Championships in the American city of Miami and the 2006 Commonwealth Games in the Australian city of Melbourne.
Johnson-Hurley was reserve umpire for the 2007 World Championships and also officiated at this year’s Worlds in Singapore.
