Proteas look ahead to the second test against England Roses

Following a 54-51 loss in the first test in Manchester on Tuesday, described by goal defence Karla Pretorius as a game of two halves, the Proteas are fuelled by the narrow three-point gap against the 2023 World Cup finalists on their home turf.

This close defeat serves as motivation for the Proteas to elevate their performance against the Roses and keep the series alive.

Pretorius assures a different and improved display in the upcoming second match over the weekend.

READ: Ann Ashworth transitions from runner to ultra-marathon official

"The first game against English Roses I would say is a game of two halves. We had a slow start but we managed to fight back towards the end but it wasn't good enough to get us over the line," Pretorius said. 

"We were obviously very disappointed in the fact that we made a lot of errors and they capitalised on all of that. So, it's something we are gonna have a look at going into game 2 but there's still a lot of positivity. There's a lot of things we can take out of game 1 and we wanna make sure that we are better going into game 2."

Meanwhile Proteas assistant coach Dumisani Chauke expressed pride in the commendable effort displayed by the younger players against a formidable netball powerhouse.  She maintains optimism regarding the Proteas’ potential to stage a comeback in the second test. Chauke anticipates a significant upswing in performance from the Proteas come Saturday. As they aim to elevate their game.

"Not the start that we wanted but the finish that we wanted gave us an opportunity as well to gauge ourselves against the Netball World Cup silver medallists. They also did have quite a few youngsters on the court on their side and we were also fortunate enough to be able to give some of youngsters the opportunity to take the court and we are quite proud of what they delivered. The future looks bright but there's still just certain things that we need to get back to the drawing board on especially when you look at the turnovers and making use of the ball when we do have it in our hands," Chauke said.