KEY POINTS:
Winning ugly is better than losing ugly.
That was the sole consolation available to Southern Steel coach Robyn Broughton today after her side beat Central Pulse 41-29 in a transtasman netball league match of questionable quality in Invercargill.
The match never rose to any heights, with two average
teams committing a succession of errors throughout the keep the scores low.
But at least Broughton was left to enjoy her side's first home win of the season and their third victory overall.
Her Pulse counterpart, Kate Carpenter, had nothing to smile about as her side suffered their eighth successive defeat to remain rooted to the foot of the semi-professional league standings.
Turnovers were commonplace, with Steel wing defence Erika Burgess pulling off half a dozen of her own in the first half alone as the home team went to the break protecting a 21-13 advantage.
The Steel started well enough, shooting out to a 6-0 lead before the Pulse awoke and slowly clawed their way back to 6-6.
The Steel edged ahead 9-8 by the end of the first quarter, at which stage Broughton introduced regular goal shoot Daneka Wipiiti, who began the game on the bench.
In her place, Jess Tuki started her first game this season at goal shoot after a week in which Wipiiti had limited training time due to tonsilitis.
Tuki was tidy enough in her brief stay but with goals proving elusive, Broughton turned to her international Wipiiti to inject more accuracy.
It worked, to a degree, as Wipiiti ended the match with 21 goals from 28 attempts, while goal attack Megan Dehn had 16 from 22 as the Steel shot at 75 per cent.
The standard of play improved only marginally as the match wore on, with the southerners earning themselves a winning advantage by halftime.
Carpenter responded at the break by taking off wing attack Neesha Wieser, employing Hayley Crofts at centre and moving captain Frances Solia to wing attack.
It made no telling difference, as Southern Steel - boosted by a fully committed Megan Hutton at goal keep - stayed in front, even though the third quarter was little better than those before it.
Hutton aggravated an ankle injury during warmups before the game but played the entire match and did much to disrupt the plans of the Pulse's young shooters Susan Tagicakibau, Amber Bellringer and Jamilah Gupwell, who between them put up just 41 shots.
The teams both shot eight goals in the third period as the Steel headed into the last quarter 29-21 in front.
The final session delivered more of the same, errors littering the progress of both sides as the Pulse never got closer than eight goals.
Steel captain Jenny-May Coffin was more interested in the outcome than the quality of play.
"It was a little bit patchy but overall I'm happy with how we went," Coffin told Sky Sport.
"We know they are a dogged, determined team ... defensively we asked out players to pick up more ball and they did that for us.
"Megan Hutton and Katrina Grant had fantastic games and Erica Burgess picked up a lot of ball for us. Out success came down to the defensive end getting us enough ball."
Pulse captain Frances Solia said the more desperate of the two sides won.
"I think they wanted it more than us," said Solia, who highlighted her team's high error count.
"It was more unforced errors, and it came down to our attackers needing to be more disciplined.
"Our defence got us enough ball but we didn't finish it off."
- NZPA
