- published: 26 Jul 2015
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Indoor netball is a variation of netball, played exclusively indoors, in which the playing court is surrounded on each side and overhead by a net. The net prevents the ball from leaving the court, reducing the number of playing stoppages. This gives indoor netball a faster pace than netball.
There are two main types of indoor netball, "6-a-side" and "7-a-side". Indoor netball has a larger focus towards mixed-gender matches than netball does, although ladies' games, and to a smaller extent men's games, are ever-present. While the sport does not have as large a following as netball does, its popularity is growing in countries such as England, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. The sport is administered at an international level by the World Indoor Netball Association (WINA).
The rules of indoor netball are similar to that of netball, with two teams aiming to score as many goals as possible. An indoor netball game usually consists of four quarters of 10 minutes. There are two umpires one for each half of the court. The winning team is the one with the most points at the end of the match. In case of a tie in elimination games, two straight 5-minute overtimes are played; if still tied, whoever is up two points will win.