By RICHARD BOOCK
If the Manukau netballers can find an edge half as sharp as their coach's tongue in this evening's national championship semifinal against Canterbury, anything is possible.
The South Auckland side scrambled into the playoffs on goal-differential last night after gaining a precious bonus point in their 50-53 loss to
Otago, but might not have been planning any celebrations if the mood of coach Jan Lundon was anything to go by.
On a day in which Auckland managed to crush defending champions Waikato 64-53 and still miss the top four, Lundon said her side was playing "dumb" netball and would have to show an enormous improvement to keep top seeds Canterbury at bay in Hamilton this evening.
Second seeds Waikato will play the other semifinal, against Southland, who over-ran Wellington 72-37 last night.
"We just played bloody awful to start with," Lundon said after the loss to Otago. "We eventually recovered and came close in the end, but periodically we just seemed to lose it and go to sleep.
"Canterbury are a complete unit - a solid team - and if we want to survive a day longer in his tournament we will have to pull our finger out. We're playing like a dumb team."
Canterbury, promoted after a year in second division, emerged as the only unbeaten side in the first grade following their 54-39 win over battling Manawatu, and on tournament form appear on target to achieve the notable distinction of making the final.
The bottom seeds started their campaign with a win over Auckland, negotiated narrow finishes against Otago and Southland, and cantered to a win over Manawatu last night, but Margie Foster is refusing to consider the silverware just yet.
"We're delighted to be playing Manukau because they're from the other side of the draw, and they're a gritty, talented line-up," she said. "We'll just take things step by step and try to stick to our plan of making small gains, and hopefully things will work out.
"It was a good workout for us tonight, because we were able to give the bench a run and rest key players, and now we want to go out there and meet our next challenge."
In the second division, Bay of Plenty finished pool play unbeaten after knocking over Waikato Premiers 56-46, while Counties beat Waikato Seniors 86-50, North Harbour downed Taranaki 69-62 and Canterbury Red accounted for Tasman 52-42.
