England Win First Series Against Jamaica

UMPIRES: Sharon Kelly, Michelle Phippard and 3rd Official Bronwyn Meek

Q1: 21-9

Q2: 38-19

Q3: 52-35

Q4: 67-54

Before I fill you in with all the details of the opening match in this Co-operative International Netball Series I want to pop a thought into your head, why haven’t England’s Netball team got a decent nickname? In fact has the team got one at all? Other nations wear cool monickers like today’s opposition “The Sunshine Girls” but the home side are just England and they wear red, which makes it trickier to get all poetic, but I’ll do what I can.

England, the home side in red, won the match by the pace they set in the first quarter where they took a 21-9 lead, by building on turnover balls in their defensive centre area and by starving the Jamaican shooters of possession - Romelda Aiken didn’t miss in the first 15 minutes but only had 8 shots - Simone Forbes nailed 50% in the first quarter - that’s to say she scored one and missed one.

England Win First Series Against Jamaica

England’s quick ball through the mid-court helped build up the lead, wing-defence Sara Bayman and goal-defence Sonia Mkoloma successful again in halting the ball’s progress into the circle. With the Team With No Nickname extending their lead into the half-time break it looked as thought a massive defeat was on the cards 38-19 after 30 minutes had the home side’s nearly 8,000 strong crowd Mexican-Waving with delight.

After a cloudy start things brightened up for The Sunshine Girls in the third quarter thanks to a number of smart substitutions noticeably Tracy-Ann Robinson on at wing defence. If the crowd thought the match was over the 3rd gave them pause as Jamaica won it by 2 goals having cut out the errors and found a path into their goal machine. One of the reasons for England’s dominance in the early part of the game could have been down to the reluctance of the visitors to lob the ball in to their 6 foot 5 not-so-Secret Weapon, when the flow of quality ball to their lofty shooters was stepped up they improved. Why the high ball wasn’t floated into the lofty Romelda Aiken earlier is a mystery because once it was an option the goals followed. One hundred percent success for the goal shooter and 88% for Forbes at goal-attack brought 16 goals.

I still can’t think of an apt nick name for England although by the end of this series there should be something that sticks and can at least take on The Sunshine Girls in the “pretty cool stakes”, I have ruled out the Roses, the Buds, Reds, Georgias… and am still at a loss.

Having not let the Jamaicans play with the ball in the early part of the match England were treated a taste of their own medicine in the last 15 minutes of the match. Jo Harten played the whole game at goal shooter with Pam Cookey staying the GA bid and both should be pleased with their statistics 85% overall for Harten (35 from 41) with her partner nailing 32 shots and missing twice in the match: surely 94% should feed the Cookey Monster’s appetite for perfection.

A good day all round for co-captain Karen Atkinson, who has now played for her country 98 times, “I’m really pleased with the way we started, goal for goal before stepping up our defence, the score at quarter-time is what we wanted. But it’s back to the drawing board to look at how we can finish as strong as we started.

Caroline McNamara, Head of sales at the O2 arena, said: “Ticket sales for The Co-operative International Netball Series match this week has an exciting last minute serge comparable to many of the O2’s pop and rock acts”.

On paper the result may look comprehensively in favour of England but there are two matches to go this week and if the Sunshine Girls start the game in Coventry less under the weather than they did at the fabulous O2 arena then they could create a storm of trouble for England… see what I did there.

By Lisa O’Sullivan.

STARTING LINE-UP

ENGLAND

GS: Joanne Harten

GA: Pam Cookey

WA: Karen Atkinson

C : Jade Clarke

WD: Sara Bayman

GD: Sonia Mkoloma

GK: Geva Mentor

Shooting Stats

Jo Harten 35/41 = 85%