Harmony 1 too strong for the third team

After an early morning warm up coach Pauline was tasked with juggling the line up for the match ahead, even with some squad members away attendance there was still a good turnout of squad members. The starting line up for this match saw Jess (GS), Alice (GA) Brooke (WA) Temi (C) Maria (WD) Devon (GD) and a returning Denise (GK).

The match got off to a steady start with the first couple of goals going with centre passes. However, Club blinked first losing the ball before it got into the shooting circle. Harmony capitalised on this and brought the ball up court swiftly and scored. The defence partnership of Devon and Denise in the defensive circle could not stop the shooters who were not missing their shots. The opposition used all their wiles to gain the advantage asking for time and complaining to the umpire just as Club were taking a centre pass causing confusion. Unfortunately, for Club we were suckered into turning over our centre pass with a held ball as we did not play to the umpires' whilstle. Club finished the first quarter down by 6 goals.

Coach Pauline made a few changes bringing on Rebecca at (GD), however, depsite some great defending by the back court, front court were finding it hard to hold on to the ball and get it in to our shooters. This quarter was not the best for Club despite the efforts of Denise trying to use her presence impose and intimidate the opposition shooters, their shooters were not missing many shots and Denise at GK was only suceeding in unwittingly beating up Becs managing to give her a right hook wihilst in the throes of defending and shoving her out of the way to gain a rebound!!. Becs took this all in her stride and continued to put on a tight defence against her GA and was instrumental in bringing the ball down court. Temi was making great interceptions managing to take the ball in the tightest of spaces without contacting her player. Club kept plugging but despite an impressive 100% shooting stat from Jess and Alice,we only managed to score 6 goals, the quarter finished with Harmony roaring ahead 29-18 alot of work to do!!

The third quarter saw more changes with Eve coming on in place of Denise at GK, Alice moving to WA and Emily taking the GA position. This quarter would be tough as everyone would have to adjust very quickly and take to the changes. Could this prove to be too bigger ask? When Club managed to work the ball down court into the shooting circle the shooters were managing to put away their shots. The defenders were working hard to try to slow down the opposition and making good interceptions. We finished the quarter still down.

The fourth quarter saw us still behind the cosh, but determined to keep going. Although the team did put together some nice court play, unfortunately this was not enough to claw back the deficit. The end score being 56 - 45 to Harmony a slight improvement to when we played this team the first time round. Our ability to focus and do the simple things well let us down in the end. But what we took away from this defeat waa that although we went down by 11 goals by the end of the second quarter, we played through this and did not let it overwhelm us, the team did not lose heart. Today was definitely not our day,