Proteas suffer heartbreak at Netball World Cup, out of title contention

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South Africa avenged their 2022 Commonwealth Games loss to Uganda by beating the She Cranes 52-50 in a Pool G match at the 2023 Netball World Cup in Cape Town on Thursday.

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The result ended the Proteas’ hopes of progressing to the semi-finals as they needed to secure an unlikely victory margin of more than 64 goals and keep their opponents from scoring more than 20 to make that happen.

Goal attack Ine-Mari Venter had a better start compared to Wednesday’s match against New Zealand, being successful with all her attempts.

Uganda however struggled with short passes around their own goal circle.

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Uganda’s star shooter, Mary Cholhok, found it challenging against South Africa’s Phumza Maweni. The Protea defender had Cholhok boxed in with little room to stamp her authority.

South Africa’s swift ball movement across the court troubled Uganda, preventing them from executing their attacking style effectively. During the second quarter, South Africa extended their lead to 10 goals, with Maweni continuing to disrupt Cholhok.

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Uganda made their first substitutions 10 minutes before half-time, but that didn’t have any effect as the South Africans went into the break 33-19 in front.

The third quarter was entirely dominated by Uganda, as they outscored South Africa by nine goals (17-8), finding their rhythm and quickly narrowing the gap.

In the final quarter, Uganda came out onto the court clearly intent on snatching the victory from the hosts – and they almost did.

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Having been 12 goals down at one point, they managed to equalise the score at 42-all within four minutes.

The match became physical at times, something Uganda coach Fred Mugerwa commented on afterwards.

A crucial intercept under the Uganda goal post by goal defence Nicola Smith turned the ball back to the South African goal circle and the Proteas managed to secure a 52-50 win.

Proteas captain Bongi Msomi said her side went into the game against Uganda to give it their all in an attempt to reach the semi-finals.

“At halftime it felt like we still had a chance. You always have a chance until you don’t have. At this stage it’s disappointing, We have to focus on keeping our ranking because Uganda is really good. If we are going to come up against them again, they are going to come hard.”

Mugerwa said they underestimated the way the match would play out.

“It was a bit physical and that’s why we were trailing by 14 goals at half-time. When we went to the dressing room I told the girls to be a bit harder and not lose hope, we have to fight for the country. And we recovered, it is unfortunate that we couldn’t take it.”