Kia Magic ready for heavyweight showdown
Press Release June 13, 2013
Coach Noeline Taurua is confident Kia Magic will rebound strongly from a sub-standard dress rehearsal for Sunday’s key ANZ Championship netball clash with Melbourne Vixens in Hamilton.
With the regular season nearing a tense conclusion, fourth-placed Kia Magic were given a timely reality check leading up to their much-anticipated outing against the team who sit one place above them.
The re-match between last year’s Grand Finalists has all the ingredients of a desperate heavyweight contest with both teams coming into the match on the back of indifferent performances and needing a win to consolidate a place in the Finals Series with just two rounds remaining.
The defending champions delivered a patchy 10-goal win over their Northern Mystics neighbours while Vixens dropped from second to third on the table in a more dramatic outcome following their upset 48-39 loss to the NSW Swifts.
``We did misfire at times against Mystics and it was a below-par performance,’’ Turua said.
``Going into the Vixens match is a whole different situation…..it’s a new week, a new team, we’re at home and we take the things that we’ve learnt from the last game on board and move on. At this moment I don’t feel any great negatives or positives coming out of that game.
``I’ve got no real concerns. The girls know themselves and we’re very clear about the standards that we set and sometimes the less that is said the better. It was just one of those games and now we’re looking at getting ourselves ready for Vixens.’’
Tuarua said credit had to be given to Mystics, who, with six internationals in their line-up, and playing their last home match of the season, were always going to fire at some stage.
``It wasn’t a comfortable match for us, so I just think for where we’re sitting at the moment, it sets us up quite nicely to know that we can actually play better,’’ she said.
``I don’t feel that we’re on the downward spiral, it was a hiccup and we know that we can be better.’’
With both teams measuring up fairly evenly and with so much at stake, a high quality contest is on the cards.
``Most times when you’re forced in to certain situations you rise to the occasion and we’re both in the same predicament, so it should be a cracking game,’’ Taurua said.
In Geva Mentor and Bianca Chatfield, Vixens have the most potent defensive duo in the competition but the Silver Ferns pairing of Casey Kopua and Leana de Bruin have proved they can be as equally imposing.
Kia Magic captain Laura Langman and Vixens’ Madison Browne are key figures in the midcourt, both feature highly in the goal assists statistics and are influential playmakers.
In the shooting stakes, both Irene van Dyk and Ellen Halpenny feature in the top 10 for goal attempts and accuracy, van Dyk with a 95.5 percent accuracy rate and Halpenny, 78.8 percent. None of Vixens’ shooters rate in the top 10 but on their day Karyn Howarth, Tegan Caldwell and Sharelle McMahon can be as lethal as any.
Fine tuning their timing and execution of the ball delivery have been key focuses of Kia Magic’s preparations this week.
``We’ve got a lot that we need to get better on,’’ Tuarua said. ``If we can control being very focussed and committed to playing our own game, we should do very well.’’
Jane Hunt
Kia Magic media liaison
Ph: 021-107-0287
