Basketball seeks financial rebound

WELLINGTON - Basketball New Zealand will be looking to new general manager, Australian David Crocker, to guide it out of a "financial disaster."

The association is insolvent after reporting a $171,694 loss this year.

But president Peter Crowhen said Crocker, the former assistant general manager of Canberra Basketball, had the credentials to turn things around.

"We have checked him out in Australia and he got glowing references," Crowhen said. "I have no doubt he is looking for bigger things in the future than general manager of Basketball New Zealand and if he can turn things around for us it will help him make a name for himself."

Crocker replaces former chief executive Hugh Lawrence, who resigned earlier this year, and will start on February 1.

He faces what the association admits is a financial mess.

But while delegates at the annual meeting in Wellington at the weekend were perturbed at what they heard, board members were re-elected.

Executive board members up for re-election - vice-president Barbara Wheadon, Sean Cassidy and Mel Young - were retained for two years while former National League general manager Mark Cameron was voted on for a one-year term.

Asked what the legal position was when an incorporated society traded while insolvent, Crowhen said the board's advice was that it could possibly be held liable, but the membership could not.

He told delegates there were two reasons for the loss.

The budget for the financial year included a nil cost for national teams, but a New Zealand tour by the Chinese women's team ended up costing $62,881.

Player registrations were substantially below budgeted levels and that was more serious.

New Zealand women's team manager Kim Lucas told delegates she was angry at the way her team had been associated with the association's big loss.

The 12 in the squad had raised $36,000 towards representing their country, and she was "wild" at their being linked to the financial mess.

For the coming year Basketball New Zealand has budgeted for a surplus that will halve this year's loss. The association will ask one of it's funding agencies to bring forward payments that would have been made later next year.

- NZPA