Norma Plummer: At no time did I promise gold

South Africa officially bowed out of the running for the title when they failed to beat Uganda by a required margin of 63 points on Thursday, after salvaging a draw against defending champions New Zealand on Wednesday.

It would always be a big ask for the fifth-ranked Proteas to upstage the likes of second-ranked New Zealand and fourth-ranked Jamaica.

Asked whether she had a message following their failure to reach the final four, Plummer quickly noted competing for silverware was never her aim but rather an unrealistic expectation that Netball South Africa president Cecilia Molekwane had publicly set.

"At no time did I ever promise that we'd be taking the gold medal, it was your president of Netball South Africa that has promised that. I'm realistic all the time. [When you] come in, and have three camps and you play against world champions, and some of these players play at a much lower level from what we've come up against”, she told reporters. 

“So, I'm totally proud of those performances. If you could come up from playing in a lower grade and compete at that level and get wins, and match it that team is growing”, said the Australian. 

While calculators were out for their final Pool G clash with the She Cranes on Thursday, the 78-year-old mentor admitted she knew their chances of a semi-final berth had been blown along with the final whistle of their 48-all draw with the Silver Ferns a day earlier. 

"We actually had to beat New Zealand to get the qualification, and maybe take Jamaica. So, my expectation was, I knew once we were done and drew and also lost to Jamaica that would be a struggle to even get there." 

However, skipper Bongi Msomi felt otherwise and revealed the conversation she had with her teammates in the dressing room before their crunch clash with Uganda.

"We definitely would've loved to be in the semi-final and in our circle, as we were talking with the girls, we were like 'Nothing is impossible'. When we went in [this game] we thought we'd just give it a crack and see how far we can go with it", Msomi believed. 

"At half-time, I have to say it felt like we still had a chance, you always have a chance until you don't. At this stage, yeah, it's quite disappointing, but more than anything we have to focus on, maybe, keeping our ranking because Uganda is really good. If we have to come against them again they're gonna come hard and I think today they showed us that they can step up and actually want to grab a win", Msomi said. 

The Proteas will face Tonga on Friday evening (18h00) in a play-off match, from which the winners will then meet either Uganda or Malawi in the 5th/6th-place ranking fixture on Sunday.

The losers of the respective play-off matches will then drop into the 7th/8th-place ranking fixture, which is scheduled for Saturday.