The first games kicked off at 11:30 Sunday morning and the last games blew full time at 5:00 from courts 1 to 9. Catch up games made up the early starters as the competition completes round one and the gears move into overdrive to welcome round two and the run home to the finals become the focus for the corporate teams.
Interestingly, the premier division teams will be in a cluster as the competition moves into the new round, with the teams fairly evenly poised throughout. Daltron is having a coloured patch in the premier division, but then Westpac, who were grand finalists last year also have had their moments. They must have breathed a sigh of relief today winning a close tie with IPA who last week, dispatched Daltron comfortably. The Leka sisters in opposing teams, were at it again, directing much of the traffic in the attacking third, but it was a more composed white and red outfit this week that had the last laugh.
Unfortunately, our images of this weeks games still have to be prepared before we can place them on the blog so you'll all have to be patient, but we did try to cover as much of the lower division games as possible.
Crowne Plaza v QBE on Court 5
Happily we can tell you Crowne Plaza won their match this week against QBE in Division 3 and in Division 2 DHL managed to escape the clutches of Century 21 with a nail-biting 16 - 15 win that had our cameras perplexed, not knowing who was what and which was whom. Both team were wearing distinctly the same colors, if that makes any sense, so looking into the lens at 14 yellow and black brightly attired players contesting the ball, certainly provided some interesting moments.
(above) DHL (yellow and black) v Century 21 (yellow and black)
Just one of those funny occasions that drive you nuts
Also in Division 2, Kina in a interesting result, lost to Petromin, who's claim to the division pennant must now be very strong indeed. Able Computing in Divison 6 still have a way to go to make a impression after making it to the semi's last year. They lost today to a snappy Pacific Industries side on Court 1 and also lost their earlier catch up match to Western Power who are showing they are no push overs it this competition. The team to beat in this division will be TCS, who have brushed away all comers for the time being and understandibly so with Loi Vele at the helm and several notable U21 "cocoons" leadign the charge.
It was an interesting day, hot, but interesting and the general feeling among pundits is that the best is yet to come so you can expect some excellent netball for the next month or so at Bisini.
Many teams seem to be slow coming out of the blocks this season and the likes of FinCorp who are perhaps rueing the loss of several key players that provided attack options and a very solid defence last year, need to overcome those shortcomings and quickly get back into a winning combination with the ladies they have. When you think about it, these things are all par for the course and as player combinations begin to work the tables will begin to turn. The question for many is, "have they left their run too late".
The images above are just to show we did cover the lower divisions and let the ladies know at the Crowne Plaza that we did remember.
The rest of this weeks images will be posted probably late Monday evening or Tuesday morning with a blurb on our take of how today unfolded. Hope you will all join us, like the ladies at Steamships who we now undertand have been authorised to browse this page for information and viewing. Thanks STC as there are quite a number of your divisional teams in this year's competition.
Please leave a comment if you think we deserve one and thank you for your patronage.
We were wondering where Margaret disappeared to.
She was seen here scrapping it with the Steamships Hardware ladies.
Good on you, girl.
She was seen here scrapping it with the Steamships Hardware ladies.
Good on you, girl.
See you tomorrow.
Near the Hoop
PNG's only Netball Newspaper
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