KERANG caused one of the upsets of the season at the weekend as the Blues led from start to finish to defeat finals contenders Balranald by nine goals at Riverside Park.
With windy conditions making scoring difficult, it was the Blues who adjusted quickest to take a six-goal lead into half-time.
Balranald refused to go away, however, with the Roos even reducing the margin to four goals midway through the final quarter before the home side rallied, scoring six of the final seven goals of the match to run out 31-22 winners.
This has been a season of near misses for Kerang, whose second win was a performance 13 rounds in the making, according to Kerang coach Chloe Adams, who was full of praise for the way in which her team has continued to attack the season despite their finals hopes having been dashed weeks ago.
“We’ve been building towards a performance like this for a long time,” Adams said post-match.
“To take home the win against a side like Balranald and be really strong right across the game was really pleasing.
“Full credit to Balranald – they came back at us hard in the last quarter.
“But I was really happy to see our girls learn from our past few weeks and take those learnings and finish off the game and get the score out to nine goals.
“It was a great win in terrible conditions.
“Our goalers shot beautifully in that weather.
“It was an awesome day and I’m just really proud of our girls.”
With five losses by seven goals or less, plus a draw against Tyntynder in round 2, 2024 has proven to be a year of missed opportunities for Kerang.
However, the Blues are set to gain a lot of confidence from Saturday’s win over a team that is expected to feature prominently during the finals.
“We’ve been in most games throughout the season and been in the contest – we just haven’t been able to get on the right side of the result,” Adams said.
“I’m just really proud of the way the girls are learning and how we’re starting to gel.
“We’ve been working hard on executing on our transition and playing to our strengths.
“It was nice to have our gains in defence capitalised on and converted.
“That was the difference and what we probably haven’t been able to do for the majority of the season, really.
“We can usually match it with most teams but it was just nice to see our gains converted on.
“That’s what you want as a defender: to watch those gains turn into goals.
“In our attacking end, our strength is short, sharp, hard netball.
“We don’t really have aerial players so our girls have to grind it out and do the work.
“We have more height down the court in terms of our defence and transition, but once it gets to our attacking end we’ve been really working on being clinical.
“‘KB’ (Keiarah Brooks) is incredible and is a naturally attacking player, but we switched her to defence this year and I think her ability to be able to attack as a defender is what helps us on that transition.
“We then have the height of young Lily Wise – having someone as tall as her through that midcourt transition is always helpful too.”
Brooks was a definite standout for Kerang, along with Blues centre Danielle Coates and wing attack Bree Cordina, with Bonnie Jolliffe, Elli-Jane Pollard and Bree Hodgson the best for Balranald.
