Netball: Injury worries as Jamaican star crowded

Triumphant Auckland Diamonds coach Tania Karauria voiced concern at the defensive screens against star Jamaican import Elaine Davis after the team's 69-60 win over Otago Rebels in the opening Coca-Cola Cup netball round.

The Diamonds' effort in Dunedin over last year's cup runner-up suggests Southern dominance in the national series may be threatened.

But Karauria is worried that opposition defences, inexperienced in Davis' style of play, are crowding the lanky goal-shoot's landing space, risking injury.

"She has very long legs and had trouble finding a place to put them on Saturday night," said Karauria. "There wasn't much room in the shooting circle with the defensive players crowding Elaine's landing space, giving her nowhere to go."

Despite having trouble with her landing gear, Davis, in sinking 59 of 64 shots at goal, was the finishing touch to the hard-working Auckland mid-court who were under constant attack from their feisty Otago counterparts.

Auckland enjoyed an overly aggressive game with Otago pushing to close down the mid-court, knowing that once it was in the shooting circle and in the accurate hands of Davis another goal would be scored against them.

"It's a real luxury knowing that when the ball goes down our side it will go in the hoop," said Karauria.

The Diamonds led all four quarters, 17-15, 35-31 at halftime and 52-45 in the third spell.

The CMTV Cometz and Western Flyers played out a thriller to draw 53-53 at Papatoetoe's Allan Brewster Stadium while the Freedom Force had a runaway 50-36 win over Anchor Magic at the Taupo Events Centre.

The Southern Sting were too strong for the Capital Shakers, downing the Wellingtonians 65-56 in Invercargill after leading 33-29 at halftime.

The Shakers' South African star Irene Van Dyk stamped her class on the match in a losing cause by converting 48 of her 51 shots at goal.

There was never more than three goals in the Cometz-Flyers clash as the teams took and relinquished the lead.

The first quarter was 12-12, with the Flyers ahead at halftime 27-24 and the third quarter 39-38.

The Cometz, however, kept fighting back with Renee Jacobsen netting the final goal of the match to give each team two points.

Cometz coach Ruth Aiken made two radical changes to her line-up, choosing height and experience to combat the Flyers' sharpshooter, Daneka Wipiiti and centre Janine Brown.

Aiken moved regular shooter Angela Maoate down the other end at goal-defence to shut down Wipiiti and used Koren Pickard as centre instead of in her usual defensive positions.

Aiken felt Maoate played well, reducing Wipiiti to 46 goals out of 60 attempts.

"Daneka is incredibly composed. She's always been a thorn in our side, but with Angela's height at least we were contesting rebounds," she said.

The teams finished sixth equal on the points table last year and their start this year shows there is still little difference between the two sides.

Early in the Force-Magic game, the combination of former Rebels players Vicki Edwards (WD) and goal-keep Katie Fay appeared to rattle Force goal-shoot Teresa Tairi and goal-attack Tania Nicholson.

Tairi netted just five of her 11 attempts in the first quarter with the score locked at 9-9.

But a significant change at the break saw Anna Tai replace Nicholson and with the skilled centre play of Temepara George, the Force shook off early nerves and raced away to lead 24-18 at half-time.

Force goal-keep Linda Vagana had an outstanding game, shutting down South African import goal-shoot Michelle Tupper in the third quarter, while at the other end Tairi and Tai kept putting away goals.