England made it two from two at the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games on Friday morning with an impressive 74-49 victory over Malawi.
Eight goals separated the two sides at half time but the Roses pushed on in the second half and a blistering final 15 minutes saw them pull away from the Queens.
Kadeen Corbin was particularly pleased with the team’s second-half display.
She said: “It was a great win from us. I thought we pushed harder in the second half.
“The first half was definitely something that we needed to consolidate a little bit more – we were getting a bit wide in attack, but that came through in the second half.”
Tracey Neville once again made several changes during the course of the win over Malawi and GK Geva Mentor stressed how important getting the different rotations out on court in the preliminary rounds will be come the later stages of the competition.
She said: “We knew Malawi were going to be pretty tough.
“They’re one of those teams that just don’t give up and I think you could see it throughout those quarters there, even when we had a bit of a buffer on that scoreline, they still never gave up.
“I think it’s important for us (to have great chemistry) and, particularly in these early rounds we’re doing, to get lots of different rotations out on the court, and that’ll serve us well until the end.
“So it’s nice to have Eboni (Beckford-Chambers) starting today, and I think with the likes of being able to bring Ama (Agbeze) on, and even the changes we had through our mid-court, the fact that we can make these changes and it doesn’t have much of a drag or lay-time for us, that’s really effective.
“Natalie Haythornthwaite had a really good game at wing-attack and goal-attack today.”
The Roses have been delighted with the level of support they’ve received so far from the Netball Family during their Commonwealth campaign.
A number of the players’ families have made the trip out to the Gold Coast Convention and Exhibition Centre.
“It’s amazing to have the support of my family – for them to fly all the way around the world is awesome,” said Corbin.
“It’s nice to have that family feel, especially after games when you can see them as well.”
The Roses now have a rest day on Saturday before they face Uganda in their next Pool B fixture on Sunday morning (06:00am first centre-pass, UK time).
However, Corbin admits there’s no rest for the wicked and the team will be preparing for facing the She Cranes.
She said: “We’re going to look at the video from Friday’s match (vs Malawi) and see what we can rectify for the next game.
“We’re playing Uganda and they’re similar to Malawi so it’s just making sure we do the small stuff right and push forward.”
For details on BBC’s coverage of the Commonwealth Games, check out their schedule.
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