G’day all. It’s Rob Harris right here at Birmingham’s NEC Enviornment the place defending gold medallist England have gained their first match of the Commonwealth Video games 74-22 towards Trinidad and Tobago in entrance of a packed home.

Australia’s first sport begins in round 30 minutes towards Barbados.

Loading

Right here’s a preview Tom Respectable wrote yesterday.

“Diamonds coach Stacey Marinkovich insists her workforce have to be cautious of the “unorthodox” model of Barbados forward of Australia’s opening Commonwealth Video games netball match on Friday however in actuality, if previous outcomes are something to go by, issues might get very ugly for the Carribean outfit.

So far as sporting upsets go on the Commonwealth Video games, a Barbados win towards heavyweights Australia could be as far-fetched because it will get given the disparity in netball assets between the international locations and performances at earlier tournaments.

Barbados, the small island nation within the Caribbean, is the bottom ranked workforce in Birmingham, but has appeared at each Commonwealth Video games since netball was launched in 1998.

Success, nevertheless, has been restricted. Barbados has gained 9 of its 33 matches, with a finest end of seventh on the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Video games.

Loading

A workforce that after misplaced to New Zealand 97-22, Barbados suffered a 79-24 loss to the Diamonds 4 years in the past on the Gold Coast. They’ve misplaced all 5 matches towards the Diamonds on the Commonwealth Video games by a mean margin of 46 objectives.

Something lower than a 40-goal defeat could be considered as a win by a workforce with nothing to lose that’s co-captained by Latonia Blackman and Shonette Azore-Bruce, who’re 39 and 40 years previous, respectively.”