Tributes to NI netball ‘mother’ Moya McVeigh

Westside Netball Club, from Belfast, paid tribute to the long serving stalwart of the sport on Facebook today.

“It’s with the heaviest of hearts that we are announcing that the Westside Netball Family has lost its number one woman - Moya McVeigh,” the club said on Facebook.

Ms McVeigh was a former chair of NI Netball Clubs Committee.

The club described her as a mother figure, “Coach, Best friend, Umpire, and Teacher to so many both within Westside and the wider NI Netball Group”.

They added: “She has been an inspiration to all of us by continually showing generations of Westsiders how to grow into strong, confident women. She has nurtured a love and enthusiasm for the sport of netball in so many of us.

“With the Netball World Cup only just having past we are taking great comfort in knowing she had an awesome last week of her life.

“She spent it with her daughters Karen and Claire and sister Dee, in Liverpool along with her other Westside daughters.

“We will smile every time we think of her shouting the loudest at the NI Warriors, laughing the hardest celebrating our Janine’s Hen [celebrations], and spending her last night relaxing together with her best friend Marie in her garden.

“We don’t even know where to begin with saying how much she will be missed by her Westside Family.”

Her daughters have asked that donations in lieu of flowers be made to the Northern Ireland Chest, Heart and Stroke Charity.

The wake will be taking place from 4pm Friday 26th July at her sister Deidre’s house at 3 Suffolk Crescent, Stewartstown Road, BT11 9JT.

The funeral will take place at 12pm on Monday 29 July at Our Lady of Immaculate Heart, Knockbracken Drive, Carryduff, BT8 8EX.