National Sports

Junior Queens lose to SA, face Lesotho today

 

The Malawi Under-20 national netball team hopes to make amends for their poor start at the Africa Union Sports Council (AUSC) Region Five Youth Games in Botswana as they face Lesotho in their second match this afternoon.

Junior Queens coach Christina Mkwanda-Nsinji yesterday was optimistic after suffering a 38-48 loss to rivals South Africa in their opener.

Malawi’s Maliselo (L) in action against Zambia

South Africa led 14-9 in the first quarter before increasing the tally to 24-15 and 39-23 in the subsequent segments.

“We played well against South Africa only that we misplaced a number of passes as fatigue took its toll on the players as we did not have adequate time for training,” she said.

“However, we are now settled and we are confident of making amends in our next game, which is against Lesotho from noon tomorrow [today].”

The competition has seven netball teams that will compete in a round-robin format before the eventual champion is identified. This means after today’s match, the Junior Queens will remain with four games to complete their fixtures; against Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana and Namibia.

This is the first time in three years that the under-20 national team has been assembled for an international event. Malawi has no junior netball league in place and the Junior Queens’ technical panel relied on the recent domestic competitions to select some talented young players.

In football, the Malawi Under-17 beat South Africa 2-1.

Patrick Mwaungulu scored in the 34th minute and Kathedwa Williard netted the second goal in the 86th minute.

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