Netball’s Spar Proteas are hoping to cut off the supply to Jamaica’s lethal goal shooter Shimona Jok as they try to find a way back into the three-match Margaret Beckford Sunshine Series in Kingston, Jamaica.
The South Africans fought well before succumbing 55-47 in the first Test at the National Indoor Stadium on Sunday.
Now they are desperately trying to come up with a strategy to counter the dominance of Jok and the rest of the higher-ranked Jamaica team.
The powerful, giant 1.95m goal shooter dominated the shooting circle as she netted 38 goals from 39 attempts.
Goalkeeper and captain Shamera Sterling-Humphrey was also immense on the defensive end.
England-born wing attack Rhea Dixon upped the tempo for the Sunshine Girls when she came on.
Proteas assistant coach Zanele Mdodana was asked where she felt the key battles would take place in the rest of the series,” Mdodana told Independent Media Sport exclusively from Kingston.
“I think it will be (about) South Africa’s ability to turn the ball earlier, before it gets offloaded into the shooting circle.
“I think it will be (about) South Africa’s ability to turn the ball earlier, before it gets offloaded into the shooting circle.
“We need to win the mid-court battle, so a lot of mid-court pressure is going to be key for us.
“We want to get a stage where, you know, (we’re) getting a good start and staying ahead.”
The Proteas had managed a good start in the series opener and were level at 12-all at the end of the first quarter.
But they seemed to be knocked off their stride by an injury to goalkeeper Nicola Smith, who hurt her arm after a heavy fall.
The rest, as they say, is history.
“So, definitely Jok is key for them but for us it’s not about focusing on the player, it’s about focusing on who is supplying that ball to her and making sure that we shut all those options down,” Mdodana said.
She has urged the Proteas players to show more resilience in the face of adversity, and to try block out the raucous home crowd that the Sunshine Girls feed off.
“More than anything else, we just need to absorb that atmosphere in that arena. You know, it is so loud we can barely hear ourselves thinking or talking.”
She said they had seen that if they could hit the ground running, build a lead and stay ahead, they could silence the crowd.
The key to that would be limiting the error count and staying competitive for the full 60 minutes.
“We know that it’s going to be grinding and hard. It’s going to be physical.
“It’s going to be everything that no player or no team wants to experience but we need to welcome that and we need to, in that difficulty, in that pressure to rise above it and be able to be able to pull through and cross that finish line first.”
The Proteas and the Sunshine Girls have played each other 18 times, with the Proteas winning three times, most notably in the Netball World Cup in Liverpool in 2019.
That 55-52 victory earned them a spot in the semifinals.
The next Test match in the series is on Thursday (2am SA time) and the final one on Sunday, January 26 (1am SA time).