Fired-up Ferns not resting on laurels
Katrina Grant has described the Silver Ferns’ surprisingly dominant victory against Australia as a ‘‘massive’’ confidence booster at the end of an otherwise disappointing international season.
While 2018 will be remembered for their horror showing at the Commonwealth Games, missing out on a medal for the first time, Sunday’s 55-44 win against the Diamonds has given the players some much needed self belief in the leadup to next year’s World Cup.
‘‘When you win, it means you know you can win. You believe you can win. That comes from winning,’’ said Grant, as the team touched down in Wellington yesterday ahead of Thursday’s Constellation Cup decider.
‘‘You always like to say you definitely believe you can win but once it happens then you can move forward and you know what it takes. But it’s not easy. We’ve been working so darn hard to get there.
‘‘But we’re not going to rest on our laurels. One win is nothing unless you can back it up, and we know that. We’ll go back into training and see where we need to work on.’’
While Maria Folau was the star performer, leading the scoring for both teams with an accurate 40 from 41 attempts, Grant said the most pleasing aspect from the stunning 11-goal victory was the fact that each of the seven starters contributed to the success.
‘‘We’ve been talking about it, how we’ve been putting together a 50-minute performance and not a full 60 minutes. But last night [Sunday] we worked for close to 60 minutesand it looked like a great team performance,’’ she said.
‘‘Everyone wanted it and you could tell. We were getting to the loose ball before the Aussies, we had each other’s back on the shooting end, everyone was so patient and Maria [Folau] shot 40 from 41, which is not bad.’’
By beating Australia by such a large margin, the Silver Ferns have kept themselves in the hunt for the Constellation Cup. However, Grant expected a backlash from the Diamonds in the final game of the season.
‘‘We saw them at breakfast and they’re not happy at all. But that’s fine. Wellington is going to be a massive battle but we live for these games.
‘‘There was a few years ago where we had to go to Perth and win by 20 and we ended up winning by 18. But it’s 100 per cent possible. You never count yourself out of it.’’