JAPS Netball Tournament - BRONZE

A squad of 10 netballers (different to those who played on Weds this week) took to the courts at JAGS Sports Club to play in the JAGS Spring tournament, you can see from the smiles that they were delighted with the end result (those bronze medals are pretty chunky) - but what impressed me, is that with a team of players who have played different amounts of netball and therefore have different levels of knowledge, they know what they need to do, how to help each other to move down the court, remind players what their role is and where they should be, support each other (we had 3 rotating subs, so there was always a cheerleading squad on the sideline) all to ensure a positive experience for every player !

With 10 minute matches (5 mins each way) the aim is to pass the ball down to your attacking goal and score whilst defending hard when your opponents take possession, and our Honeywell girls did just that, on *every* occasion.  

Lovely warm up, led by Emily and a quick 'shoot 5 goals in and then we'll play a half court game' to give our shooters a little confidence pre-matches....and we were off!  

vs Alleyns and a 5-0 win - Honeywell went hard and fast and to be honest, I'm not really sure what happened, other than the team dominating the play, so with a quick change of subs at half time, we won comfortably!

vs JAGS 1 - this was a little harder, and whilst Honeywell continued to pass the ball towards our goal, we simply couldn't pop the ball in in the goal, so a loss 0-1.

vs Oakfield 2 - Honeywell decided to show Amanda and I that they were confident netballers, and delivered a confident 4-0 win.  

vs Eaton House 2 - 0-4 (Loss) This was a match I thought we had a good chance of winning, however Eaton House were strong, much stronger than a 2nd team (as shown by the fact that they beat Eaton House 1 in the final rankings...)  what was pleasing to see were familiar faces I've coached in other places (there are downsides to spreading netball knowledge...)  

vs JAGS 2 - reversing the 4 goals in the last match to Honeywell, we won 4-0.

Oakfield 1 in match 6 was a 2-0 win, followed by a 1-0 win vs Eaton House 1. 

It was cold, the sun was shining, but by the end of the day our squad was ready to pop their coats back on, but not quite ready to leave until we'd heard the results....Quietly confident, Honeywell sat down and waited as the results were announced:

8th - Oakfield 2, 7th - JAPS 2, 6th - Oakfield 1, 5th – Alleyns, 4th - Eaton House 1

3rd......Honeywell !!  

Bronze medals (large ones at that) were handed round to all of our netballers - wear them with pride next Friday in assembly.

2nd - JAGS 1

1st - Eaton House 2