Gems continue to sparkle

The Zimbabwe Gems’ fairy-tale run in the Vitality Netball World Cup continued in Liverpool, England last night with a 66-41 win over Barbados.

Pauline Jani was in fine form as she shot 51 of 53 shots to power the Gems to another victory over a side ranked above them.

Jani, who completed the game with a 96 percent accuracy rate after sinking 51 out of 53 shots, said although they were nervous at the start they quickly settled as they realised they had a good chance of winning.

“I am really excited, we defended as a team and we won as a team. They are a bit slow and from what we learnt against Australia we realised we needed to be fast when approaching the shooting third. So we improved on that today.

Meanwhile, Zimbabwe’s coach Lloyd Makunde who could not hide his joy, said they were now looking forward to their next encounter against Malawi on Thursday with confidence.

“Team work prevailed today. We made changes and the game kept on rising. All the substitutes played well, they upped their game so kudos to the whole team.

“We wanted this, I thought we were going to win and then we won the game, we are happy. But then we are not celebrating, we are waiting for the Malawi game and then after that we can celebrate”.

Zimbabwe have won the hearts of many neutrals with their performance in the competition so far, and came into the game with the possibility of earning a top-six finish at their first ever World Cup.

If Zimbabwe defeat Malawi on Thursday, they will earn a place in the fifth/sixth place play-off.