Botswana thrash Lesotho in netball opener
Kabelo Boranabi | Tuesday July 26, 2016 15:14
The majority of the players earned their first international caps, in front of an almost packed arena and they put the visitors on the back foot from the first whistle. The locals use long balls from the wing attacker and the centre to the goal shooter. The visitors, playing with relatively shorter players opted to play at a slower pace, using bounce passes in an effort to counter attacks from their taller opponents.
The home team put a sterling performance as they won the first quarter 20-2. In the second quarter Botswana started to show signs of complacency as they occasionally made errors when they entered the final third, the shooting accuracy also was not up to par as they missed a lot of chances.
However, Lesotho failed to make count of the free throws as Botswana took a 35-6 lead to the halftime. Local team coach, Judith Mawela made use of her pool of attackers as the team came into the third quarter with a completely new front line.
With Lesotho showing signs of tactical indiscipline in the goal circle, the local girls capitalised from the free throws, and the quarter ended with Botswana having a resounding lead of 47-6.
From the start of the final quarter, Lesotho made tactical changes as they opted to play the ball in the middle court with little intention of going forward, in trying to avoid an embarrassing scoreline.
This, however, back fired as they could not keep the ball for long thus giving Botswana a superior advantage going forward. Botswana triumphed 66-9.
Speaking after the game, Mawela credited her team for a sterling performance.
“Lesotho made it difficult for us in the sense that they played a type of game, which we are not used to. They played a lot of bounce passes but credit should go to the girls looking at the fact that it was their first international game for most of them,” Mawela said.
She faced a selection headache ahead of their clash against Zambia yesterday.
“It is difficult to have a lot of shooters who are all accurate, but at the end of the day as a coach you will have to pick the best combination. Unlike Lesotho, Zambia plays the type of netball we are used to. We will match them because we know how they play,” she said.
Mawela also said her team is not under pressure as they are using the tournament as part of the preparations for next year’s World Cup.