Thunder Struck by Lightning

A young Northern Thunder side were the visitors to the Loughborough University netball centre on Saturday evening to take on a inform Lightning team. Thunder were probably relieved to see that Lightning had rested goalshooter Alex Astle from the Lightning team that had taken top spot in the league the previous Saturday. Sadly for them the Lightning attacking line still fired in a team performance that hit 89% shooting accuracy and blew the young Thunder defence away.

The game started at amazing pace with the O’Sullivan, getting only her second start in NSL, fitting in seamlessly to the Lightning mid-court. James and Stephenson were showing great court awareness in the attacking end to create space for O’Sullivans feeds and the score quickly went to 9-2 in Lightning’s favour. Thunders work rate was high but they couldn’t counter the fluid movement of the Lightning team. At the end of the first quarter the score was 20-9 to Lightning and the signs were ominous for Thunder.

Lightning rotated their line-up at quarter time to take James off and bring Harten in at goal shooter. Initially it took Lightning a few minutes to get used to a new shooters movement patterns. However as Harten and the mid-court began to read each others games Lightning put together a string of eight unanswered goals. The young Thunder line-up kept working and put together a few slick moves of their own but it was largely one-way traffic. At 42-19 ahead at half-time it looked as though Lightning might break the 80 goal barrier for the first time.

Lightning took the opportunity of the comfortable lead to make numerous half-time changes. Lauren O’Doyle came on a GA to give Lightning its third attacking line up in three quarters, Kate Murphy came on at WD and Kara Luck entered the fray for the first time at GD. With other positional changes as well the team struggled to find the same rhythm as the first half. Lightning kept up the pace of their movement and defence but occasionally the ball was going astray and crucial moments. This was also due to a more aggressive Thunder defence, boosted by the return from injury of key player Nicola Szehofner. Szehofner stepped out in the second half after a long lay off from a back injury and her presence clearly lifted her team. Lightning were still dominant but slipped below the 20 goal a quarter mark from the first half.

The final quarter saw Lightning change their line-up again with Olivia Murphy being replaced at WA by O’Sullivan. The new look Lightning mid-court stuttered a little as players had to adjust to new team mates and the intensity of the Lightning performance dipped a little. Thunder had also introduced Charlotte Beenham at GA who then produced their best shooting performance of the night scoring 7 from 8. Lightning still outscored Thunder 15-11 to win the game 74-38 but didn’t hit the same heights in this final period.

With a crucial match away against Bath this Friday night Lightning will have been more than happy to give so many players a run out. This performance underlined the depth of talent in the Lightning squad whilst also showing that there is room for improvement. The many young players out on court showed that they have fantastic skills but can still learn about each others games to become a more effective unit.