A squad of 11 Navy women came over to play five matches against Guernsey’s representative men and women alike at Beau Sejour between Wednesday and Saturday, together with long training sessions, in an exhaustive training trip for next month’s Inter-Services.
A Guernsey men’s squad coached by Gill Queripel used their firepower to dominate a Wednesday night full-hour game 60-19, after which they secured narrower victories in two 40min. matches – 29-13 on Friday and 22-19 on Saturday. The latter was a mixed affair where Guernsey lent players to the opposition.
The tall and physically resilient Navy squad had edged the Friday women’s game 34-29.
A more developmental Guernsey side had started strongly to draw in the first quarter, at nine goals apiece, but gradually slipped further behind as the match progressed.
However, using a first-choice Panthers squad against an understandably tired Navy on Saturday, they triumphed 45-38 in front of a sizeable home crowd gathered on the balcony.
A storming start had them turning over their opponents’ first two centre passes and swiftly converting them, not taking long to build up an 8-2 advantage.
Despite disruption from an injury to experienced mid-courter Becky Chamberlain, they battled on to win the quarter 16-11 and the first half 27-23.
Guernsey were making constant changes and seemed to lose significant momentum mid-way into quarter three where, after a resurgent Navy producing an eight-goal scoring run, their advantage had slipped to just one.
Panthers then refocussed, combining important turnovers with impressive conversions from Bryony de Garis and Eva Bourgaize to bring their lead back into safe territory.
Centre Charlotte Hill ultimately earned player of the match for her efforts in controlling the game.
Coach Bridget Yabsley, deputising for absent director of netball Sally Carns, was ‘really proud’ of her side.
‘I’ll be happy to report to Sally, who’s on holiday, that we had a successful day,’ she said.
‘The whole set-up of the weekend was more a development/mixed squad yesterday, whereas this squad is our travelling squad for our next weekend away.
‘It was about getting our girls match-ready for next weekend’s regional games against CD Phoenix.’
Panthers will be playing both Saturday and Sunday against the founders of the CD Phoenix Regional League, so this victory proved an encouraging send-off.
‘Brilliant result at the end of the day,’ Yabsley added.
‘Our options and our pairings throughout the court worked well and the girls kept pushing through really.’
She also highlighted the energy brought by young mid-courter Mariella Groulef in that match and, in a similar vein, credited fellow U19 Emelia Mullins’ effort the previous day in controlling the centre and making great interceptions.
But Georgie Parfit ultimately received the Navy’s POM vote for the Friday after her great defensive showing.
Navy head coach Linda Cairney gave her thanks to Guernsey for being ‘so welcoming’ throughout their trip.
The Navy only get one real opportunity per year to come together as a full team for a week of training and competition before the Inter-Services, so what better location for it?
‘Guernsey give us that facility to get away from work, get away from commitments and things, and really start working for the first time all season as a team,’ Cairney said.
‘We’ve been working on that. We’ve been working on tactics, team ethos, team spirit, unit work, and the matches give us that opportunity to consolidate under pressure – and they’re the right level for the pressure.’
Although the head coach admitted her players were rather fatigued after the five matches, on top of long training sessions, they will now be much readier for what the other services teams can throw at them.
‘We know Guernsey have helped get us in a better position to compete at Inter-Services, so we’re just really grateful.’
Men’s coach Queripel was pleased to give opportunities to several players that had not faced the Navy before across the weekend.
As for their dominant mid-week showing? ‘We had one of our strongest teams out there on the Wednesday night,’ she said.
‘We had James [Robert, star attacker] as well and we were on it.’
Summing it all up, she added: ‘It was just a really good week from our point of view.
‘We were fitting in with what the Navy wanted to achieve, as it’s their training week before the Inter-Services.’
