Netball: No letting up by dominant Ferns

By Suanne McFadden

The worries of opposing netball captains Belinda Colling and Irene van Dyk this morning are poles apart.

Colling wants to spend more time under the hoop with her Silver Fern shooting sidekick Donna Loffhagen before they tackle the world championships.

Van Dyk wants her South African team to start from scratch again - before tomorrow night.

South Africa are very much half the team that New Zealand are. They were pummelled by 43 goals in Saturday night's second test in Christchurch, 82-39, after a 39-point hiding three nights before.

The Proteas believe, however, that they should be only 20 goals behind the Ferns at the worst. The only way to prove that in the final test in Auckland is to wipe the board clean and rewrite a simple plan.

Once the South Africans get behind on the scoreboard, they visibly slump. Even the opposition sense it.

"There was a phase during the game - halfway through the second quarter - when you could feel them drop," Colling said of the Proteas.

"That's when it became really important for us to concentrate. It becomes a test to maintain your own focus on the game."

South African co-coach Bennie Saayman was blunt when she reeled off the list of her team's downfalls.

They were too slow, threw the ball away, put up little defence, did not interpret the umpires calls well, and were simply not good enough. New Zealand, she said, were just too fast.

"We are very, very disappointed. We have tried everything," Saayman said. "It's up to the players to lift themselves now."

At the other end of the spectrum of contentment were the Silver Ferns. Coach Yvonne Willering was a lot perkier after the 82-39 win than she had been following the first thrashing. She even sang a song to her 50-cap players, Bernice Mene and Lesley Nicol, at the after-match function.

It was Colling, this time, who pointed out some room for improvement in her partnership with Loffhagen.

The pair were in sparkling shooting form again, Loffhagen scoring 38 from 47 shots and Colling 39 from 45, but they want to forge a better intuitive understanding in the circle.

"Before this series we had only one game together this year, against Australia. They didn't put us together in the Star Series, so we still need time together," Colling said.

Tomorrow night is their last test together before the September world championships, but the Ferns will meet every second weekend in the run-up to the tournament. Despite the crazy gap between the two sides, this series has not been a waste of time.

The Ferns have been allowed to throw a dash of spice into their game, without getting too fancy. Feeders Anna Rowberry and Sonya Hardcastle have shown some class touches, while wing-defence Nicol has pushed herself to the bounds of endurance, particularly in her half-century test in Christchurch.

All four circle defenders got court time, and more often than not kept the ball from reaching South Africa's shooters.

Teenager shooter Adine Harper even got to play in her first test on Saturday night, and despite some nervous shots, moved well around the circle.

The game was over for the Proteas once they lost the opening pass-off of the match. They were 4-1 up in the infant stage but it turned out to be a mirage for all the reasons that Saayman gave afterwards.