Jamalco title no surprise for Nevers

Winston Nevers, head coach of Jamalco, said he was not surprised by his team’s nail-biting victory over defending champions Upsetters 'A' in the final of the Netball Jamaica/Supreme Ventures Major League competition, as his players executed the game plan well throughout the contest.

Jamalco produced an impressive display to record a narrow 37-36 victory over the dethroned champions at the Leila Robinson Courts on Saturday.

"It was a good performance from us because I know the Upsetters team well, and they fought and kept us on our toes throughout the game. It was tense, but we prevailed in the end," said Nevers.

"We did set a target that we wanted, and we did look at some people that we wanted to shut down in the form of Paula Thompson, Sabrina Spence, and Petal Smith, and so those three persons are really good in the attacking area," he said.

"We looked at them and said, if we cut down Paula Thompson's workload from putting the ball inside the circle we would have it much easier, because Sabrina is going to shoot less, and so that is what we did overall."

Jamalco trailed their opponents 18-17 at half-time. However, the Clarendon-based team stepped up their game in the third quarter as they rallied strongly to outscore Upsetters 12-6 for a 29-24 lead.

Despite being outscored 12-8 in the final quarter, Jamalco held their nerve to secure the victory.

Goal shooter Vanessa Walker-Blake led the way for Jamalco with 15 goals from 21 attempts, while Shania Martin scored 13 from 20 and Gezelle Allison added nine from 13.

Sabrina Spence, with 22 goals from 30 attempts, and Petal Smith, with 14 from 20, were the main scorers for Upsetters.

Nevers added that his team showed a lot of courage throughout the match, especially in the final quarter when they came under heavy pressure from their opponents.

"We showed a lot of guts and determination throughout the match, because we made some tactical changes in the third quarter and we went up by about six goals," he said.

"But in the last quarter when they tried to come back, we did control the game a bit, despite them outplaying us in this quarter. The overall standard of the game was good because both teams played well, and the only difference is that we dug a little bit deeper than them, and so we carried it through and it just went in our favour," said the veteran coach.

Meanwhile, Speg A captured the Intermediate A title with a comfortable 37-27 win over Titans. Global B won the Intermediate B trophy after a 31-24 victory over Untouchables, Spartans secured the Minor League title with a 31-24 win over MD Strikers A, while Excel Eagles captured the Mini League trophy after an easy 19-6 win over Panthers D.