Their 27 turnovers in general play against the Giants in the 51-58 loss contrasted starkly with their 17 the previous week in a 22-goal win against the Adelaide Thunderbirds.
And it’s something that goal defence Jo Weston says they’ve addressed as a group as prepare to face up against a resurgent Sunshine Coast Lightning this weekend.
“We were disappointed with the result on Sunday,” Weston says.
“There were quite a large amount of unforced errors from both our attack and defence lines.”
But she says they’ve also chosen to dwell on the positives from the outing, which saw veteran Renae Ingles make her return from retirement, and a better understanding among the team’s defenders.
“There were a lot of things we were really positive about, especially in our defensive group, welcoming Renae into our defensive fold and also the partnership between myself and Emily (Mannix) out on court. We did actually have quite limited time together in the preseason due to my participation in Comm Games and Em had a concussion, so I think we’re finally starting to get a little bit of gelling, which is great,” she says.
The Vixens’ defence end will need all of its connections firing if it hopes to counter a Lightning line-up that topped 60 goals for the first time this season in Round 5 against the Adelaide Thunderbirds, and has won two games on the trot after dropping three to start the season.
But Weston says her team’s height through the midcourt could tip the scales in their favour.
“Without (Laura) Langman in their midcourt that does sort of put them in maybe a weaker position than what they were last year, but I definitely think they’ve been able to compensate for her absence pretty well,” she says.
“Kelsey (Browne) and Laura (Scherian) are really quick, however they’re a little bit shorter than our defensive line-up, so potentially that may work to our advantage, but I think we’ll have to wait and see.”
“We’ve been watching them quite closely over the last couple of rounds so it’ll be a really interesting battle on the weekend, I think.”
“Defensively they’re really strong and they also are in the attack line with Steph (Wood) and Caitlin (Bassett) so it’ll be a real challenge for us across the court but I think if we can develop what we took from last week it’ll hopefully put us in pretty good stead.”
While the Vixens leaned heavily on their starting seven players last season and rarely tinkered with their line-up as they wrapped up the minor premiership and fell just short of a grand final berth, Weston says this year they’re well aware of the need for depth in the squad, with wing defence Chloe Watson missing last week with a knee injury and Weston herself forced from the court with rolled ankle in Round 2 against the NSW Swifts.
“We’re really looking at having a strong 10 players who can take the court in a multitude of different positions. We really took that learning from the game against the Swifts where I was off for a couple of quarters and we had to re-jig our line-up,” she says.
“It’s a matter of feeling 100 per cent confident when we do get out on court in a position, which may not be the one we spend the majority of our time in, and having confidence in each other that we’ll be able to perform.”
The Vixens take on the Sunshine Coast Lightning at USC Stadium on Saturday at 3pm AEST. Purchase tickets here, or catch all the action LIVE on Channel 9 or the Netball Live app.
