Uncompromising YMP defender Bronya McMenamin (on the ball) will be a major factor in the Gisborne Premier Grade netball grand final tomorrow in the YMCA. She and her defensive partner Keasi Williams-Fonahema (background) have been powerhouses for the top-seeded side who face Waikohu Prems at 1pm.
Photo / Paul Rickard
Uncompromising YMP defender Bronya McMenamin (on the ball) will be a major factor in the Gisborne Premier Grade netball grand final tomorrow in the YMCA. She and her defensive partner Keasi Williams-Fonahema (background) have been powerhouses for the top-seeded side who face Waikohu Prems at 1pm.
Photo / Paul Rickard
YMP and Waikohu will fight it out to decide the 2024 Gisborne Premier Grade netball champions tomorrow afternoon after convincing semifinal wins on Wednesday night.
The Jan Duncan Memorial Trophy goes on the line between two teams who signalled from the start of the competition that they would be there at the business end.
Turanga FM YMP (1) defeated last year’s champions Whāngārā Old Girls 57-28 and Claydens Waikohu Prems outgunned TR Builds Horouta Koura 62-45.
Top seeds YMP led at the end of all three quarters – 14-10, 33-15 and 47-21.
The game started hard and fast with both teams producing great movement through the court, and only four goals separated them at the first break.
However, YMP stepped up a notch in the second quarter and won it convincingly, 19-5.
As they have done throughout the season, they worked as a team on defence, pressuring their opponent’s ball carriers to create turnovers, resulting in the ball being dispatched speedily into YMP’s attacker’s hands and finished off with goals.
They were leading by 18 goals at halftime and continued their dominance for the rest of the game.
The whole team worked hard for the full hour and produced some good passages of play, but YMP restricted these.
The quarter scores again told the story of Waikohu’s win over Horouta – 19-13, 32-24 and 49/36.
It was a competitive game in which both teams varied their options to deliver the ball through the court to their shooters.
Waikohu took an early three-goal lead which they had doubled by the break.
The second quarter was the tightest but Waikohu won it 13-11 to move further ahead.
Horouta Koura contested well and the scoreline often went goal for goal for much of each quarter, but they could not peg back the difference.
Horouta and Whāngārā finished the season third-equal.
Waikohu's Humaria Higgins gathers the ball under pressure from Old Girls Whāngārā's Maiangi Mackey-Gilroy. Higgins and her teammates are a win away from Gisborne Premier Grade glory. They face YMP in the final.
The YMCA is expected to be packed for the Premier final which starts at 1pm.
Last time YMP and Waikohu met, the teams were locked 17-all at the first break, 31-all at halftime and Waikohu went into the final 15 minutes up 43-41.
It was basically goal-for-goal but YMP finished strongly to win by five.
Both teams displayed excellent netball skills, with everyone working extremely hard on attack and defence.
But tomorrow will be the added pressure of finals netball and who handles that the best will determine the champions.
YMP, coached by former Ikaroa Rāwhiti MP and national netball league player Meka Whaitiri, have made the final nine times in the past 11 years and have won five of them – the last of those in 2022.
If tomorrow’s final lives up to 2023 - which Whāngārā won over YMP by two goals in the second period of extra time - fans are in for a treat.
Waikohu lost to YMP in the 2022 final and will be just as determined as their opponents to lift the silverware.
Both teams have half of their squads from that final so know each other’s play well.
Over the road at Victoria Domain, the other Senior grades have their finals.
At 9.30am, in the A Grade final, Whalis play Claydens Waikohu (2) while the 1st Grade final pits Smash Palace Sportsfit against Claydens Waikohu Social B.
At 10.30am, the Prem Reserve final is between TR Builds Horouta Taimana and Brendan Fry Builder Sportsfit; the 1st Reserve final is Ūawa Ngarangikahiwa v Allwood Enterprises HSOG; and the 2nd Grade final is between Tatapouri Sportsfit Social and YMP Manawanui.
Teams for tomorrow’s Premier Grade final (*denotes players who were in the 2022 final between the sides)
