BY MAGRETH RUZVIDZO
Zimbabwe senior netball team registered their first win at the Africa Netball cup after accounting for Namibia 50-49 in a closely fought contest this afternoon.
The Gems bounced back after were blown 78-27 by South Africa in their opening match on Tuesday.
The Africa Netball Cup got underway on Tuesday and runs until the 16th of November.
In today’s match Namibia managed to dominate from the first quarter up into the third but the Gems managed to take the initiative in the decisive final part.
The first three quarters ended in favour of Namibia with the first quarter finishing at 18-13, second quarter 29-25 and third quarter 40-37, all in favour of the hosts.
It was until the last quarter where Gems took the lead when they managed to make use of the turnovers that came their way. However, although the Namibians kept the Gems on their toes in the last quarter as they kept on defending hard, the Gems managed to wrestle the lead and defended it until the final whistle.
Gems coach Lloyd Makunde said that he kept on pushing his players when they were down.
- Chamisa under fire over US$120K donation
- Mavhunga puts DeMbare into Chibuku quarterfinals
- Pension funds bet on Cabora Bassa oilfields
- Councils defy govt fire tender directive
Keep Reading
“I was not down, we had to keep on encouraging them, I had faith,” said Makunde.
“I just told them to make sure that our centre passes are made into goals and then we have to force turnovers and shoot them and that’s exactly what they did.”
Zimbabwe will face Malawi tomorrow in their third match at 3pm. It is mostly likely going to be a challenging affair for the Gems having lost to the same team by 56-38 at the Pent Series last week.
Makunde wants to see an improvement by his team if they are to give themselves a good chance of winning against Malawi.
“We need to make sure that our turnovers should be converted into goals, just that,” said Makunde.
- Follow Magreth on Twitter @MagrethRuzvidzo
