Olympics: European hosts thump visiting women's teams

By DAVID LEGGAT

The Tall Ferns and Black Sticks both suffered solid defeats as they continued their Olympic Games buildup in Europe yesterday.

The Tall Ferns suffered the worst result of their three losses at a four-nation tournament in Poland when they were thumped 67-46 by the hosts in Krosno yesterday while the women's hockey team went down 5-2 to Germany in Mannheim in their first European leadup to Athens.

For the basketballers, the loss followed defeats against Ukraine 71-66 and Germany 68-58.

New Zealand were undone by a dreadful second quarter which they lost 19-7. Their problems stemmed in part from testing new offensive strategies. They trailed 39-19 at halftime and although they lost the second half by one point they were unable to make up the deficit.

Forwards Gina Farmer and guard Angela Marino scored eight points each and forward, and Silver Fern Donna Loffhagen seven.

"Defensively we did okay. We were holding them down but couldn't get any offence going," captain Leanne Walker said last night.

"We have a lot of work to do on our offence. We just couldn't score in the first half."

The Tall Ferns had their best period of the tournament against the Germans 24 hours earlier when they got to halftime 33-29 ahead. However, they dropped the third quarter by nine points, which decided the game.

Farmer and Marino were again the pick of the scorers in that game, with 15 and 13 respectively.

The Tall Ferns now travel to Istanbul for a six-nation tournament. They have five games in successive days, starting with Lithuania on Friday.

Meanwhile, the Tall Blacks, who have settled into their base at Jacksonville, Florida, will have their first Olympic warmup game against Puerto Rico today in the first of two matches against the team they eliminated in the quarter-finals of the world championships two years ago. * Black Sticks coach Ian Rutledge was far from downhearted at the size or manner of the loss to the Germans.

World No 7 Germany were 2-0 up after half an hour, but New Zealand pulled one goal back through a penalty stroke from defender Lizzy Igazan.

New Zealand, ranked two places below the Germans, equalised with a field goal from Niniwa Roberts-Lang but Germany pulled away with three goals in the last 15 minutes in a game played in 30C heat.

"About 60 per cent of what we did was very good and taking into account the conditions and stress on the players over the last few days it was a reasonable performance," Rutledge said last night.

"Overall a lot more positives came out of it than negatives."

Coming out of a New Zealand winter, the heat was what the squad expected and wanted as they prepare for Greece.

The Black Sticks travel to Den Bosch today to play world No 3 Netherlands early tomorrow before returning to Germany for two more games against their hosts this week.

* Cambridge rider Melissa Holt is best placed of the New Zealand contingent on general classification going into today's final stage of the Thuringen-Rundfahrt six-day women's cycling tour in Germany.

Holt was lying 45th, with fellow Olympic-bound road rider Joanne Kiesanowski 51st.

Holt had been the best finisher of the New Zealanders in the fifth stage from Gera to Schmolln yesterday. She was seventh, 1m 05s behind stage winner Zoulfia Zabirova of Russia, who recorded 2h 37m 12s.

Zabirova leads the event on general classification, 1m 09s ahead of Dutch rider Mirjam Melchers.

Kiesanowski was 22nd yesterday and Auckland's Toni Bradshaw 59th. Kiesanowski had achieved the best individual stages results, with ninth and 10th placings earlier in the tour.