City West Falcons claimed the Victorian Netball League grand final on Saturday night with a five goal win over VU Western Lightning. 85049_16 Picture: MATHEW LYNN
By LIAM TWOMEY
CITY West came out on top in the highly anticipated Victorian Netball League grand final showdown against VU Western Lightning on Saturday night.
The paths of the two teams couldn’t have been more different going into the match with City West one of the competition’s powerhouse sides while VU had fought tooth and nail throughout the latter part of the season to reach the biggest game of the year.
After securing a direct path to the grand final, it was the Falcons who made the better start, opening up a five goal lead in the early stages of the first quarter.
The Lightning set about trying to reel in the margin and slowly started to find their feet in the contest.
By the start of the final term, both sides were back to even and it looked as though the match was set up for a grandstand finish.
However, three costly errors from VU provided an opening for City West and Marg Lind’s side didn’t need to think twice about taking it. Again the Falcons shot out to a lead and this time there would be no coming back as City West secured the match 42-37.
Western Lightning coach Matt Hills was disappointed with the result after his side worked hard to get back in the match.
“The girls again showed a massive amount of ticker as they have done all season and in this finals campaign to get back in the contest and put ourselves level at three quarter time,” he said.
“The first five minutes of the last quarter we made three basic errors and all of a sudden we were five goals down and we just couldn’t bridge that gap. They were able to stay the course under pressure in the last 10 minutes.”
Despite the loss, there were a number of positives to come out of the season for Western Lightning who improved from finishing second bottom last season.
Hills also credited the performance of Fiona Themman who overcame a tough season off the court to bring her best on the big stage.
“I thought personally she was best on court. She didn’t get the award but she really took it to Kathleen Knott who is probably the premier goaler in the competition,” Hills said.
“For Fiona to lose her father suddenly midway through the season, who was a staunch supporter of her netball and for her to come out and play that sort of netball was a great effort from her.
“She came out and played probably one of her best games for the season.”
