By Matt Fotia
The Origin Diamonds’ Constellation Cup defence is off to a rocky start following a heavy 14 goal loss to the New Zealand Silver Ferns at TSB Arena in Wellington on Sunday night.
The two sides traded goals in the opening quarter before the hosts flexed their muscles in the second, scoring 17 goals to nine to open up a nine-goal lead at halftime.
They finished the job with a flourish, winning 64-50.
Star shooter Grace Nweke led all scorers with 50 goals from 53 attempts, while midcourter Kate Heffernan impressed with four gains.
Speaking post-game, Marinkovich credited the Silver Ferns for their strong showing but lamented the Diamonds’ inability to meet their usual standards.
“They (New Zealand) were aggressive with what they did out on court in terms of their control of court space and in attack they went direct, and they held possession,” Marinkovich said.
“It’s something that we weren’t surprised about, but we just weren’t on song tonight.”
The Diamonds never got going in game one.Diamonds captain Liz Watson echoed the thoughts of her coach, citing the World Champions’ inability to halt the momentum of the Silver Ferns, who went on a number of long, unanswered scoring runs.
“There are different ways that we want to play to be able to combat what the Ferns can throw at us, but we just didn’t do it for 60 minutes,” Watson explained.
“We let their runs (of momentum) get too big. Something we pride ourselves on is being able to stop the momentum and stop those runs.”
The Diamonds were able to get their hands on plenty of ball in defence, finishing the match with 10 deflections - one more than their hosts - but couldn’t convert those into scores, managing just three goals from four gains.
By comparison, the Silver Ferns had seven gains, six of which resulted in scores.
Marinkovich was quick to point out that the international game lends itself to attackers more than defenders but agreed the Diamonds’ inability to capitalise on their turnover opportunities hurt their chances of victory.
“Overall, there’s not a huge amount of defence in international netball, it’s very much an attacker’s game,” Marinkovich said.
“You’ve got to hold possession for long periods of time, you’ve got to be really accurate to post and you’ve got to make the most of the opportunities you get (on turnover), and we let a couple slip.
“There were a lot of deflections for both teams, so they’re getting hand on ball, but it’s just how you chase and pick up and I think New Zealand did that well.”
All 12 game day Diamonds squad-members saw court time during the loss.
Goalers Cara Koenen and Sophie Dwyer impressed off the bench after experiencing limited minutes in the Diamonds’ recent 2-1 series win against England.
Sophie Dwyer was impressive off the bench.Marinkovich was pleased with the efforts of her bench but emphasised the ongoing need to develop a number of combinations.
“We certainly used a lot of the variety we’ve got out on court tonight,” Marinkovich stated.
“Sometimes when things aren’t working strategically you can try and shift things with personnel and each player brings different attributes to the court.
“Some things worked, and some things didn’t, so we’ve got to keep working on building combinations.”
