Ferns hurt by shooting pains

Homegrown shooters have been neglected in New Zealand netball and it’s come back to sting the Silver Ferns at the Commonwealth Games.

Poor shooting sunk the Ferns in their 54-45 final pool match loss to England yesterday.

New Zealand had 62 attempts against England, one less than the Roses, but converted just 73 per cent of their chances. Compare that to England’s 86 per cent and the way Jo Harten and Helen Housby shared the workload, both landing 27 goals.

It wasn’t just one match the Silver Fern shooters were off, it’s been the entire tournament.

In their five pool matches, the four Ferns shooters have made 292/368 (79 per cent) of their attempts. Bailey Mes is the worst, hitting just 30/47 (64 per cent).

The magic number for any shooter is 90 per cent and the Ferns have been well below that.

Australia’s combination have Temalisi Fakahokotau. New Zealand converted just 45/62 attempts for the game (73 per cent) compared to England’s 86 per cent.

Maria Folau carried New Zea- Shooting statistics from the four leading teams:

Australia 341 of 361 shots ( per cent) England 342/389 ( per cent) Jamaica 300/343 ( per cent) New Zealand 292/368 ( per cent) missed just 20 goals in the tournament leading into their final pool game against Jamaica. The Diamonds have hit 341/361 (94 per cent), while Jamaica 300/343 (87 per cent) and England 342/389 (88 per cent) are all above the Ferns.

A glut of imports in the shooting end at franchise level and a lack of opportunities for promising young Kiwi shooters has hampered New Zealand netball.

At one time in the former transTasman league, three of the five Kiwi franchises all had overseas players wearing the goal shoot bib.

Jo Harten (England) was at the Magic, Mwai Kumwenda (Malawi) at the Tactix and Jhaniele Fowler-Reid land’s shooting end, converting 30/39, but lacked support from her shooting partner.

England have bottled it against the Ferns in crunch matches at (Jamaica) at the Steel. Australian Caitlin Thwaites was also Pulse goal shoot from 2011-13.

Franchises want to win and clearly felt young Kiwi players were better off in reserve roles.

Even in the 2018 competition, South African star Lenize Potgieter (Magic) and veteran Australian Kate Beveridge (Tactix) will be lining up in the shooting ends.

Four Kiwi teams had import goal shoots last season, though Kadeen Corbin (Tactix) and Afa Rusivakula (Stars) spent plenty of time on the bench.

That’s a huge problem. The Silver Ferns have been heavily reliant on Maria Folau since the greatest shooter of them all, Irene van Dyk, retired from international netball in 2014.

With Folau’s career drawing to a close, the Silver Ferns face the glaring issue where their next leading shooter will come from.

If young Kiwi shooting talent continue to have their pathway blocked by import players, New Zealand’s attacking issues will only exacerbate. previous World Cup and Commonwealth Game tournaments. They threatened to do so again at the start of the final quarter, but regained their composure.