By Lorna Campbell

singapore vs bermuda

Shelby Koh (centre) and Jocelyn Ng of Singapore defend against Bermuda. Singapore won the match 56–49 to finish 15th at the World Youth Championship. (Photo 1 courtesy of Lorna Campbell)

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Glasgow, Scotland, Friday, August 30, 2013 – Targeting a top-16 finish when they came into the World Youth Netball Championship, Singapore went one better and closed their campaign in 15th after defeating Bermuda 56–49.

Singapore started strongly to give themselves a 14-6 lead after the opening quarter. Once again, the shooting combination of Melissa Teo and Jocelyn Ng were working well with the mid-court players. At the other end, Aqilah Afiqah and Yun Zhen Seah were doing all they could to prevent Bermuda clocking up goals.

Despite their small stature across positions, Bermuda were gutsy and fought for everything and tried their best to upset the Singapore flow and composure. Bermuda won the quarter to close the gap to trail by six (27–21) at half-time.

Short, sharp passing was once again most effective for Singapore and when they played with that game plan, there were several passages of play that were very smooth, controlled and executed with confidence.

Bermuda continued to push them all the way and it wasn’t until the closing minutes of the final quarter that the girls had established a comfortable margin to be sure of the victory. The game ended 56-49 to Singapore with the players delighted to end on a high note.

Coach Joanne Loo summarised the performance across the championship. “It has been a great tournament. When we beat Papua New Guinea in our opening match we knew we would reach our target of top 16. We came close to challenging for top 12 and then lost to PNG on the second meeting to miss out on 13th place, but here we are in 15th and we’ve learnt a lot and had some good performances.”

Captain Shelby Koh praised her teammates, saying: “We are very happy to finish in 15th position. I am very proud of the team; we have come a long way so it was a good finish. This has been a great experience for us and we are very grateful for the opportunity to compete here.”