Constellation Cup: New Zealand ‘s impact on Australia for the second time in the series’ history | Netball News

The Silver Ferns came from behind to deliver a final test final across Australia, which secured the Constellation Cup on Sunday. The result ended a nine-year wait to pick up the award again and add another piece of money to their ever-growing prize cabinet.

Costumer Dame Noeline Taurua won the series 3-1, after turning around a deficit in the first half during the fourth and final game against their rivals Australia’s top rivals.

At full-time, the crowd moved home joyfully, who were allowed into Christchurch Arena for the final game after New Zealand’s change in the COVID-19 warning level, when their team captured the Australian Diamonds have dropped their Constellation Cup.

It was a test series delivered in more ways than one. He battled a global pandemic, survived three earthquakes and, perhaps more importantly, reinvented the international netball wheel.

With the Commonwealth Games taking place next year and the Netball World Cup looming after that, fans and neutrals came to the series with a curious eye.

The question was, how would the two top netball countries perform? Here we take a look at some of the key talking points …

New Zealand know how to win

While the Constellation Cup is now safe on the shores of New Zealand, the journey to get it was not always a simple sailing for the Silver Ferns.

In three of the four test matches, New Zealand were heavily down at half-time, meaning a defending second half was the only way to win.

Surprisingly, against the toughest challenge in the world, the Taurua side were able to achieve the required performance on two of the three occasions.

With each last season to come, Australian side Stacey Marinkovich looked tired alongside the fighting fern, who overcame victory from their grip.

Although, it does not seem to be a pattern that Taurua will be particularly happy with, given that its players could have put themselves in such positions if they had started stronger, there is no doubt that the head coach will still be happy.

The Silver Ferns, unlike Australia, seemed to always rely on their play plan, and at no point did they move to pressure when the heat was applied.

For the rest of the world watching, breaking New Zealand’s new era of self-belief is perhaps the hardest part of their game so far.

Is this the end of Australia’s presidency?

Cash at the 2018 Commonwealth Games, cash again at the 2019 Netball World Cup and now without the Constellation Cup. For the first time in Australian netball history, the world is No 1s without any money products.

It’s a hard fact for the new head coach of the Diamonds, Marinkovich, who had a not-so-good side in a decent position before the series, but it’s the same fact.

Of course, Australia are a huge team under construction and two absentee strikers, in the form of Gretel Bueta and Steph Wood, have been lost. Maybe now, with nothing left to defend, could this be a moment in time for the world of 1s to recall and recover?

Surprisingly, even with more than 490 days away from international netball, the Diamonds were extremely competitive and not far from the mark.

Young hunters feel good

In an area where experience is valued above all else, it was the young, progressive players for both Australia and New Zealand who captured their imagination.

For most of the series, firing circles on both sides were built with players all under the age of 26.

At 23, Maia Wilson played all four games and carried most New Zealand shooters on her shoulders. During the trip, she scored 140 goals for the Silver Ferns.

Down in the late Diamonds, debutantes Kiera Austin and Cara Koenen went up to the plate and in doing so, controversially, the Australian captain and captain Caitlin Bassett the bench, to the bench.

Koenen specifically asked a number of questions about New Zealand’s defense, apparently ruling free from baseline.

The 25-year-old Sunshine Coast Lightning (and a former Taurua student), partnered well with Austin to create a mobile firing ring, something of a new experiment for Australia that Bassett was largely reliant on. as a target shooter.

Are Suncorp Super Netball rules to blame?

For those who agree on Australia’s loss, the focus may shift to embracing the impact of Suncorp’s Super Netball rule changes in recent years.

With two times each half at any time while play is in progress, there are mobile substitutes and a two-point Super Shot, the netball played by those in the Australian national side a week -a-week, has become quite different from that played under international rules.

For some, the result of the differences was a rule of thumb throughout the series.

The amazing nature of coming back from New Zealand was that the players seemed to come together on the court during a quarter for delivery; rarely after a play break or a substitute when they could move the tide.

In contrast, Australia was never able to produce their own counter-play when New Zealand began to surrender. Even with late substitutes, players still showed fatigue and openness coming at the end of the game.

Could this be partly due to reliance on Super Netball times that are frequently used to stop counter moves? It is likely to be a talking point that threatens Australia’s national side for years to come.

Of course, it’s not just the Diamonds that are affected by these rules. International players including England, South Africa and Jamaica are all trying their hand at Suncorp Super Netball.

For New Zealand, winning the Constellation Cup is another step towards world netball control. For Australia, it was a steep learning curve; memories of what they have, and what else needs to be done.

For the rest of the world, it was an inspiring series and an opportunity to explore two of the world’s leaders and see how they are progressing, just over 12 months ago. from the next Commonwealth Games tournament in Birmingham.