Malawi Queens fail to reach semis, lose by 1 goal to Jamaica: Netball World Cup

Malawi Queens on Friday endured a second consecutive Netball World Cup defeat with a narrow 62-63 against Jamaica at Sydney Olympic Park, Australia shattering the dreams of reaching the semi-.finals.

It was a close contest match which Malawi Queens should count themselves unlucky to have not secured the semi-final berth.

The Sunshine Girls, fourth-ranked team in the world, were level on points with Malawi, ranked sixth before the match.

The result decided the team to advance to the last four behind Pool E leaders New Zealand.

Jamaica led Malawi in first and second quarters by 19-13 and 19-16.

Malawi Queens won the last two quarters by 17-10 and 16-15.

It was a tense finish as the match would have gone any way.

Praise should go to the tenacity of Malawi players who rallied to cause the upset.

Mwayi Kumwenda netted 39 of her 41 goal shooting attempts and goal attacker Sindi Simutowe had a 100 percent shooting accuracy netting 23 out of her 23 attempts.

Simutowe, who received 26 centre pass, had seven goal assists while Kumwenda has one goal assist.

Bridget Kumwenda (Wing Attack), Takondwa Lwazi (centre), Grace Mwafulirwa (Wing Defender), Caroline Mtukule (Goal defender) and Goalkeeper Lauren Ngwira did put up a fight in all fairness but it was not to be.

However, there is a flicker of hope, Malawi Queens team is under development and they will break the top four in the next world netball outing.