Netball: Force need win for home semi

By RICHARD BOOCK

Maria Lynch knows the Force is with her when she speaks of upsetting national netball league champions the Southern Sting tomorrow.

The coach of the North Harbour-based Force accepts her players will carry underdog status into the top-of-the-league showdown at the North Shore Events Centre, but said yesterday that they still fancied their chances of ending the Sting's seven-match unbeaten run.

In third-place on the Coca-Cola Cup table, the Force can secure a home semifinal only if they beat the Sting and the Canterbury Flames lose to the Cometz in Christchurch, an unlikely scenario given that the Cometz crashed to the lowly Magic last weekend.

Lynch, the New South Wales state coach, said while her side were not worrying themselves with the final jostling for playoff berths at the weekend, they believed in themselves and felt capable of matching-up against anyone else in the league.

"As well as the Sting have played, I think they're beatable," Lynch said. "No-one's looked invincible in this competition and we feel quite lucky about striking them now, at a time when we can have a good hit-out against them before the semifinals "There's been a noticeable upturn in everyone's attitude this week. We're at the business end of the competition now and you can feel the players stepping up in terms of their attitude, preparation and concentration."

While the Force look a formidable unit on paper the line-up including four members of the New Zealand squad (Teresa Tairi, Sheryl Clarke, Linda Vagana and Temepara George), former Silver Fern Tania Nicholson and Australian mid-courter Elise Middleton-Lynch said her side probably needed to find more consistency to go all the way.

"To beat a side like the Sting you need to put four good quarters together, and to be frank, we've had too many games where we've started strongly, lost direction for a couple of quarters, and have then finished well.

"At this level you need to do the basics well and concentrate for the full 60 minutes - and I reckon if we can manage that we could knock them over."

The match, which has attracted a sellout crowd of around 3000, should throw up some fascinating match-ups.

The only other game with any playoffs relevance in the final round of pool play is between the Cometz and the Flames at Christchurch's Cowles Stadium, where the Canterbury side are not expected to pass up the chance of cementing a home semifinal.

If Margie Foster's Flames win, the Force would then need to beat the Sting by more than 20 to sneak into second place on goal-difference.

In other matches, the Western Flyers will host the Otago Rebels in Wanganui today, while the Auckland Diamonds will finish their season tomorrow when they square off against the Magic at Unitec Stadium.