South Africa’s challenge at the 2025 World Netball Youth Cup got off to a strong start when the Baby Proteas beat Barbados 102-27 in Gibraltar. Their display against the islanders, who they have beaten twice in two meetings, will have sent warning signals through the rest of the competition.
Next up for South Africa, appearing in the World Netball Youth Cup for a seventh time, are Trinidad and Tobago on Monday.
Barbados opened the scoring, before South Africa took charge of the opening quarter, easing 25-7 clear.
Baby Proteas coach Precious Mthembu kept the same team coming into the second quarter and they continued where they left off. In the first fifteen minutes of the match, the South Africans took the game to Barbados a lot more and continued suffocating the middle of the court which made it difficult for Barbados to stretch South Africa and play. Mthembu made a change midway through the second quarter with Renezia Andrews coming in for Luane Smith. At the end of the quarter, they led 54-15.
South Africa had made last minute changes to their team just a few hours before the match with Jade Atkins withdrawn from the team due to an injury and replaced by Andrews.
At the start of third quarter, Mthembu made two changes and brought in some fresh legs on court. At the end of the quarter, they had stretched out to lead 77-21 and remained dominant in the final quarter.
“What a great performance tonight that was displayed by our players. I am thoroughly impressed by players energy, they were so focused, the team worked. I think we executed our game plan very well especially offensively – we shared the ball very nicely and everyone on court was able to contribute. It is games like these that remind one of how and why discipline is important. The score did not alter our discipline,” said Mthembu.
