Basketball in Malawi

Basketball is a team sport played by two teams of five players each and is played on a rectangular court (tutorialspoint, 2016). The players try to score by shooting a ball through a hoop elevated 10 feet above the ground. According to tutorialspoint (2016) Basketball was invented by Dr. James Naismith in 1891 to engage players in an indoor sport during winters to keep them fit. He designed a sport loosely based on his childhood game Duck on a Rock where players have to hit a stone, called a duck in the game. The duck was protected by other players and placed high on a rock. The main objective of basketball is to make a goal and score points. A goal is made by shooting the ball through the basket or hoop. The goal post or basket for a team is in the opponent's court. Each team should not only try to make a goal and prevent the opposite team from taking control of the ball, but should also try to protect the basket in their court and prevent the opponent from making a goal. Federation Internationale de Basketball Amateur (FIBA) is the international regulating body of basketball. It governs rules, appoints referees for international tournaments and conducts world cups every four years for both men and women. It is based in Geneva.

BASKETBALL IN MALAWI

In Malawi, Basketball Association of Malawi is the main body that governs basketball. It is affiliated to Malawi National Council of Sports (MNCS), Malawi Olympic Committee (MOC) and FIBA. One of its mandates is to ensure that it coordinates all basketball activities that also include identifying and connecting prospective partners to the game. The Association currently has a calendar of events which is followed by all zones. The Association has three zones, namely Central Zone Basketball League (CEZOBAL), Northern Zone Basketball League (NOZOBAL) and Southern Zone Basketball League (SOZOBAL). In the meantime the association has one product, i.e. the conventional 5 aside game, whose calendar in all respective zones are clearly defined. In future it plans to incorporate 3 on 3 street basketball, targeting other audiences and wheel chair basketball, for the lame and disabled.

The biggest event that is coordinated by BASMAL in a basketball season is the national championships where regional teams form all zones compete to be national champions. BASMAL consists of the board, president, vice president, treasurer, general secretary, vice general secretary, committee members and zones chairpersons as the general assembly. The sub-committee is made up of technical, publicity, women, youth and discipline committee. The zones are administrated by the secretariat which reports to main executive committee and the board.

CENTRAL ZONE BASKETBALL LEAGUE

According to CEZOBAL secretariat, Central Zone Basketball League (CEZOBAL) was established in the early nineties and is the umbrella body that manages basketball in the central region and is comprised of teams from the region. The league runs in three categories which are; Men's League A which has twelve teams, Men's League B which has thirteen teams and Women's League which has eight teams. It is affiliated to Basketball Association of Malawi.

The CEZOBAL committee is mandated to oversee basketball activities in the zone and committee members are elected every four years by the zones affiliated teams. CEZOBAL committee is also comprised of the following sub committees headed by the chairperson; Women's Development, Youth Development, Referees and Publicity comitees. The league is self-sponsored with main revenue generated from team registration fees and runs from April to October every year. The main venue for games is Civo outdoor court with other courts spreading across the zone like ABC indoor court, Mphungu outdoor court, Don-Bosco outdoor court and Bunda outdoor court.

CURRENT SYSTEM FOR CEZOBAL OPERATIONS

Information to teams from the committee is communicated via the General Secretary's office and vice versa. Fixture are a created using a software and kept in a word document at the CEZOBAL secretariat. Results from games are recorded in the same world document and are communicated to team leaders using phone calls and messages. Similarly assigning a referee to a match is done by the referee committee and the match reports are kept at the secretariat.

Computing of the log table, player registration and checking about eligible players for matches is done manually. Checking of eligible players for matches involves players and CEZOBAL carrying identity cards for verification to each and every match. Fans of the league and other stakeholders are communicated about fixtures, results, venues and other information using sports radio programs.

PROBLEMS WITH THE CURRENT SYSTEM

The current manual system being used by CEZOBAL is subject to many problems and is not as efficient. This is because the information is stored in papers and a word document hence organizing, retrieval and communication is a challenge. Fans of the league have to tune to radio programs to know where they can watch matches .The major problems associated with the Current system can be summarized as the following:

• It's very slow
• Time consuming
• Repetitive
• Not user friendly
• Creates a gap amongst users
• One way flow of information

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

There's disorganization and lack of backup of information in the Central Zone Basketball League. Statistics from the previous league seasons cannot easily be accessed because the information was stored in papers hence maintenance is a challenge. The whole process of player registration, fixture scheduling, team registration is done manually. It has also been reported that some fixtures have been canceled due to teams not being notified about the fixture program in time because communication is a challenge as the committee needs to send information to each and every team individually. In addition, there's low patronage of games because spectators are not aware of the statistics and venue of matches in time (Gomani, 2018).

Therefore Management Information Systems being of such importance in sports management, it can be concluded that the manual system being used by CEZOBAL is not efficient and effective enough which is hindering the management of Basketball in the Central Zone Basketball League.

GOAL AND OBJECTIVES

GOAL

The main goal of this project is to build a web based Basketball Management Information System that will automate the process of managing basketball in the Central Zone Basketball League.

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