SHOOTING STARS
Proud Proteas bloom in world cup
● Bongi Msomi and her warriors will fight England for the bronze medal at the Netball World Cup today after getting edged out by Australia in their semifinal yesterday.
In two of the tightest semifinals in history, Australia ousted SA 55-53 and New Zealand downed the hosts 47-45.
England beat SA handily in the final group match on Thursday, 58-47.
But if SA can reignite the fire they unleashed against the Aussies at the M&S Bank Arena in Liverpool yesterday, they’ll have a great chance of winning their first medal since 1995.
If frustrated football, cricket and rugby fans are searching for new national heroes, they need look no further than the ladies who went to war in England.
Sure, they lost; yes, they made mistakes that cost them in the end; but they showed a spirit on the court that hasn’t been seen often enough the past few months.
SA seemed out of it at halftime, when they trailed by eight goals. But they fought back to just a single-goal deficit on two occasions in the final quarter before losing.
Phumza Maweni and Karla Pretorius were ramparts in defence, halting attacks and sparking counter attacks.
Khanyisa Chawane, Erin Burger and Msomi all produced world-class performances in the centre court, while Lenize Potgieter and Maryke Holtzhausen were deadly in front of the basket.
But they also made a few too many mistakes, especially in the opening two quarters.
In fact, their opening error of the match probably cost them the game. SA started the game and fed the ball to Potgieter who scored for a 1-0 lead.
Then they stole Australian ball, but Potgieter failed to score. The Aussies hit back to equalise through goal shooter Caitlin Thwaites.
If anything would have knocked the SA belief that they were going to beat Australia for the first time in their history, it might have been that.
SA and Australia went goal for goal for more than 10 minutes before the Diamonds nailed a turnover and scored to take the lead for the first time, at 8-7.
They were four up after the first quarter . SA produced turnovers of their own on several occasions, but too often they couldn’t convert these into points.
Potgieter (39 goals) and Holtzhausen (14) missed two goals each in the match, but there were too many passes that went astray out on the court as well.
Of the top teams in world netball, England is the one side SA has beaten in recent years. Hopefully they can do it again today.