‘Farcical scenes’: Lightning lose netball match in overtime after thinking they’d won
By Steve Barrett
A bizarre scoreboard bungle helped the bottom-placed Giants get their first win of the Super Netball season under the league’s new overtime rules in Sydney on Saturday night.
The Giants eventually beat the bewildered Sunshine Coast Lightning 86-80 in a controversial result that kept the Queenslanders outside the top four.
Lightning keeper Ashleigh Ervin expresses her frustration during Saturday night’s controversial Super Netball match against the Giants.Credit: Getty Images
Believing they had a one-goal lead, the Lightning played keepings-off in the final 30 seconds of regulation time to reach the full-time siren with the stadium scoreboard showing them ahead 71-70.
Players and coaches from both sides shook hands, Lightning shooter Cara Koenen was announced player of the match and disappointed fans began filing out the exit doors.
But there was a discrepancy with the final scores, with Champion Data declaring a 71-all draw.
The umpires and Lightning players had already headed to their rooms but the Giants stayed on the court, expecting extra time.
“You have to call it as you see it. These are ridiculous scenes. These are farcical scenes, where we don’t know whether these two teams are going to resume, having spent minutes clarifying the scores,” Fox Sports commentator Matt Russell told viewers as the drama unfolded.
The Giants were adamant there had been a technical error and that the scores were tied.
“We were always very confident that it was a draw, and we actually protested at the time that the score was changed,” Giants coach Julie Fitzgerald said during the protracted 50-minute delay between the end of regulation and the start of overtime.
“The players were aware it was a draw.
The Giants celebrate their belated win.Credit: Getty Images
“When we came off, we were a little bit bewildered.
“I would have thought that there would be some sort of provision in place for what should happen now.”
The stats bench furiously went back through the match feed and examined each fourth-quarter goal.
Twenty minutes after the full-time bell, the stadium scoreboard was officially updated to 71-71.
There was a competition rule change before the season that drawn games would require overtime, but an exception looked an option when it was thought the umpires had left the building.
The umpires eventually emerged and were re-microphoned, while the Lightning players also re-entered the arena.
“[We were told] that there was a score review and a drawn game,” Sunshine Coast coach Belinda Reynolds said shortly before play resumed.
“We’re a little disappointed at that because, obviously, we had possession in the last part of the game, which we would have played a lot differently and gone to post.”
Lightning coach Belinda Reynolds.Credit: Getty Images
Fitzgerald pulled off a shock coaching masterstroke to begin overtime, replacing captain Jo Harten with unused sub Matisse Letherbarrow.
The sharpshooting replacement duly nailed nine goals, including three super shots, as the Giants snatched the match away from Sunshine Coast with an 11-1 blast to start the extension.
It was heartbreak for the Lightning for the second week in a row, after the Melbourne Mavericks pinched a win from them last week.
Prior to the controversy, the match had been a high-class thriller, with no more than one goal separating the two sides at any break.
Koenen nailed her first 33 shots while Lightning teammate and Diamonds skipper Liz Watson racked up 36 assists and 66 feeds.
At the other end, Sophie Dwyer was a shooting force, Jamie-Lee Price consistent in the middle and Letherbarrow the hero at the finish.
AAP
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