Changes

'''Netball''' is a team sport that is played on a court with seven players on each side.

'''Netball''' is a team sport that is played on a court with seven players on each side.  It is a variation of basketball, played on a basketball court, but with the rules modified to reflect concerns in Victorian England that basketball was too unladylike for women to play.

==History==

==History==

[[James Naismith]] invented [[basketball]] in 1891 in [[Springfield, Massachusetts]].  At the time, he did not standardize the number of players on each side, but allowed a variable number to accommodate the number of players present.  Basketball quickly spread to London, England in 1893, where some people questioned its suitability for women and their clothing.  Netball as a sport separate from basketball traces back to [[Martina Bergman-Österberg]] who introduced it in 1893 to her female students at the Physical Training College in [[Hampstead]], London.<ref>McIntosh, Peter C. (1968). Physical Education in England Since 1800. London: Bell. ISBN 071350689X. OCLC 41636 p. 292</ref> In 1901, the Ling Association (later the Physical Education Association of the United Kingdom) published the first codified rules of netball.<ref>Taylor, Tracy (November 2001). "Gendering Sport: The Development of Netball in Australia". ''Sporting Traditions, Journal of the Australian Society for Sports History'' '''18''' (1): 57–74.</ref> Although netball spread to some Commonwealth countries, it never gained the popularity of basketball in other locales.  Initially, the different nations used different rules for the sport. In 1957, International Federation of Netball and Women's Basketball (later the International Federation of Netball Associations (IFNA)) was formed to administer the sport worldwide under standardized rules.<ref>{{Cite web |author=International Federation of Netball Associations |title=About IFNA |url=http://www.netball.org/ifna.aspx |accessdate=2011-06-28}}</ref> In order to obtain funding, the IFNA then lobbied the [[International Olympic Committee]] (IOC) for two decades to seek recognition.  In 1995, the IOC recognized the IFNA as an international sports federation, although that step does not make netball an Olympic sport.   

[[James Naismith]] invented [[basketball]] in 1891 in [[Springfield, Massachusetts]].  At the time, he did not standardize the number of players on each side, but allowed a variable number to accommodate the number of players present.  Basketball quickly spread to London, England in 1893, where some people questioned its suitability for women and their clothing.  Netball as a sport separate from basketball traces back to [[Martina Bergman-Österberg]] who introduced it in 1893 to her female students at the Physical Training College in [[Hampstead]], London.<ref>McIntosh, Peter C. (1968). Physical Education in England Since 1800. London: Bell. ISBN 071350689X. OCLC 41636 p. 292</ref> In 1901, the Ling Association (later the Physical Education Association of the United Kingdom) published the first codified rules of netball.<ref>Taylor, Tracy (November 2001). "Gendering Sport: The Development of Netball in Australia". ''Sporting Traditions, Journal of the Australian Society for Sports History'' '''18''' (1): 57–74.</ref> Although netball spread to some Commonwealth countries, it never gained the popularity of basketball in other locales.  Initially, the different nations used different rules for the sport. In 1957, International Federation of Netball and Women's Basketball (later the International Federation of Netball Associations (IFNA)) was formed to administer the sport worldwide under standardized rules.<ref>{{Cite web |author=International Federation of Netball Associations |title=About IFNA |url=http://www.netball.org/ifna.aspx |accessdate=2011-06-28}}</ref> In order to obtain funding, the IFNA then lobbied the [[International Olympic Committee]] (IOC) for two decades to seek recognition.  In 1995, the IOC recognized the IFNA as an international sports federation, although that step does not make netball an Olympic sport.