By Dhammika Ratnaweera reporting from Singapore
A revived Sri Lankan team has come out with some magical performances at the Asian Netball Championship in Singapore, which is also considered as the World Cup qualifies for the next years’ championship in England. Sri Lanka, the only unbeaten team in the tournament will face host Singapore in the final on Sunday the 9th of September.
With a huge encouragement from the spectators, the hosts Singapore got the better off the defending champions to beat them 51 points to 43 in the second semi-final. The two teams met each other in the second round with Sri Lankan beating Singapore 74-61.
A committed Sri Lankan netball coach Thilaka Jinadasa said that they have passed the first hurdle to qualify for the world cup and not it is their focus to be crowned as the Asian champions, a title that they have missed since 2009.
“I think the final against Singapore in this atmosphere is going to be very tough. We beat Singapore in the league round, but the situation is very different in a final match” said the Sri Lankan coach, who did not want to underestimate their opponents. “We are doing the final preparation very seriously but there will be no training session before final.” added Jinadasa.
She said that Singapore will exploit the home advantage with an encouraging crowd support. “There was a good support from the Sri Lankans living in Singpore today for our semi-final match against Honk Kong, I request all of them and many more to come and cheer our lasses to win a Asian title for Sri Lanka” Jinadasa said.
“Everyone in the team is very happy and is confident with their winning spree, they are phisically fit too. we had to swap players to keep them fit for the finals.” explained Jinadasa promising that they will come out with a good game plan for Sunday’s match.
Meanwhile, the Singapore national netball coach Natali Milicic, who is from New Zealand, said their team had really performed well during the semi-final match. “We beat the same Malaysian team in the league round with one point margin, but in the semi final our players were well placed with good passing and defence to finish the game successfully.” said Milicic.
Singapore said that Sri Lanka had very strong side with extra benefit of 6.11 tall shooter Tharjani Shivalingam and likewise we have got the home advantage. “We have to mainly focus about Tharjani. This is team event and we will come up with a good plan to counter-attack” said a positive Milicic.
Sri Lanka will play Singapore at 13.30 SLT.
Finals
| 9 September Sunday |
35 | 7th/8th | 10.00am | 3rd of Group F: India |
v | 4th of Group F: Japan |
| 36 | 5th/6th | 12.00pm | 1st of Group F: Thailand |
v | 2nd of Group F: Brunei |
|
| 37 | 3rd/4th | 2.00pm | Loser of Game 33: Hong Kong |
v | Loser of Game 34: Malaysia |
|
| 38 | Finals | 4.00pm | Winner of Game 33: Sri Lanka |
v | Winner of Game 34: Singapore |
|
| 5.30pm | Closing Ceremony & Prize Presentation | |||||
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