Australia on course for netball semis after physical encounter with Malawi

Australia remains firmly on course for the semifinals stage of the Netball World Cup after another dominant performance in which they brushed aside Malawi 70-46 on Tuesday. 

Australia, who leads Group F after making it four wins in as many matches, have a day off on Wednesday, but they return to action against rivals England on Thursday. 

Looking back at the victory, Australian coach Stacey Marinkovich was full of praise for improved Malawi for having given them a good and physical test on court. 

“Malawi are very good at holding possession, they showed their athleticism, they were persistent in their movements, which is something that we fully expected.

“They just play a little bit different, the line of the ball and the pace in which they play is a little bit unorthodox and you just have to get your head around it. Both teams were scoring quite well, so it was just a tussle.” 

In the knockout stages, Australia are possibly to meet either New Zealand, Jamaica and England, and Marinkovich said it was good to play against a physical side like Malawi before that. 

“We spoke as a team that this game against Malawi was going to give us a bit of everything, a team that holds possession and plays short, which resembles other teams that we are going to come up against. 

“Some physicality, body presence, contest and athleticism — and their jumps. So thought it was a great one for us to be able to have to adapt and shift in different moments.” 

On England on Thursday, Marinkovich said: “It is exciting to be able to go into these games because we want to be able to put our performance into really good practice against the next level.” 

Australian player Jo Weston said though Malawi put up a fight, they were never really in danger of losing the match. 

“I feel like we knew that the game would probably be tight, especially in the first quarter. We knew that if we were persistent, especially in our defensive pressure, we would be able to force them into errors and win ball all over the court.” 

In other matches, Barbados narrowly beat Singapore 55-50, Tonga also had to dig deep to eventually overcome stubborn Scotland 55-47 and Zimbabwe beat Sri Lanka 71-36.