Victoria have had another successful day out at the Marie Little OAM Shield in Brisbane, after three convincing wins against the Northern Territory, Australian Capital Territory and Western Australia.
The final game of the day came down to Victoria and South Australia who were the hot favourites after the first two days of the competition. In what was a tight battle between two tough teams, Victoria were unable to close the margin and fell short by six goals.
There were plenty of highlights to take from the day, with Claire Nugent, Rachel Potter and Sky Grace having a successful day in the defence end, especially in the first two games against the NT and WA. There were a range of impressive intercepts, and their defensive pressure was replicated down the court by their teammates.
Bianca, Kim and Renay rotated throughout the attack end for the day, with each experimenting a different role. Having played together for several years, their connection out on court was noted and a real asset for the team.
Victorian head coach, Naomi Linossier was really pleased with how the team handled such a big day and how they continued to showcase some phenomenal netball.
“Overall another really great day, we played some really good netball. It was a challenging loss against South Australia, but they are a really good side and I’m looking forward to battling it out tomorrow in the gold medal match,” Linossier said.
“Hopefully after some rest, we’ll have a few more fresh legs to pull from. But we’ll talk to the team tonight about some new strategies we could implement after seeing how they played today.
“We’ll focus on what we probably could’ve done a lot more of more of today, in terms of our attack and defence to make sure that we have the best team out there.”
In game five against a newly created ACT team, Grace Dean and Brooke Baker showed wonderful sportsmanship to the girls who were still developing their skills and looking to shoot their first goal for the day.
Emma Daffy and Erin Munckton were consistent under the ring today, both utilising their speed and strength to find space on the court and be an option going into the attack end. Erin and Emma contributed significantly to the scores throughout all games.
“The sportsmanship the team played with today was probably the highlight for the entire tournament so far.”
“Especially when we’re playing ACT in their first ever Marie Little Shield and the way the girls got behind them and helped them out, meant they had a really positive experience.”
“Despite the score line it was really amazing to watch.”
Victoria will face South Australia in the gold medal match tomorrow at 10.30am on the main show court.
Today’s results:
VIC 36 v NT 5
VIC 33 v WA 6
VIC 41 v ACT 10
VIC 15 v SA 21
