Poly sitting pretty
If there is one club that epitomises the journey netball has been on since the game was first envisaged in the very early 20th century, it has to be Poly Netball Club, which plays in the premier divisions of the Middlesex County and North London Netball Leagues. Watch below to hear player Natalie Morris talk to current President Lesley Tischler about what makes the club so special, other than being in the Guinness Book of Records for being the longest continuously running netball club in the world!
History of The Polytechnic – the story of the world’s oldest netball club
Quintin Hogg, founder of the first Polytechnic, was a firm believer in the health-giving and character-building qualities of sport. He practised what he preached, claiming to have played a record "fifty years of footer".
Hogg provided the Polytechnic with generous facilities to support his enthusiasm. When he acquired new premises at 309 Regent Street in 1881, he immediately converted the Great Hall into a gymnasium. In 1884 he added an indoor swimming pool, the first in a public building in London. He bought the boathouse at Chiswick in 1888.
Benefiting from these facilities, the Polytechnic rapidly developed some of the largest clubs in the country covering a wide range of sports.
Polytechnic’s dominance in national sports was demonstrated in the London Olympics of 1908. All competitors were made honorary members of the Polytechnic, which also organised the opening and closing ceremonies, and established the distance for the Marathon, which was restored as a modern event.
One year before, in 1907 there had been no mention in the archives of any ‘basket’ or ‘net’ ball activity but at a Garden Party, held on 8 June an exhibition match was held at Chiswick between a men’s basket ball team and a women’s basket ball team. From then onwards there are regular references to ‘basket’ ball until 1910 when references change to ‘net’ ball (for both men’s and women’s teams).
The Polytechnic became the University of Westminster in 1992.