While most of the competition enjoyed its first week off since the season began a month ago, four clubs did battle on Saturday afternoon to complete round four.
Violet Town and Lancaster had already made the big statements of the round in moving to maintain perfect 4-0 records, so Saturday’s games featured sides on the periphery of finals places.
Murchison-Toolamba took the biggest plaudits on the day, putting the foot down in firm control of Longwood and never letting up.
This contest between two sides who started 1-2 looked anything but equal, with Emily Wood and Lucy Ewart named the best performers in a simple 71-32 win to square the ledger.
Murchison-Toolamba’s Alice Cunningham savoured an expected result with a gelling side.
“We thought we were going to win, so we set ourselves some goals with things we’ve been working on,” Cunningham said.
“We wanted to make sure we were on top of them before we move into the next three games.
“We walked away pretty happy with the way we organised ourselves on the court and ran through some of our plays.”
Those three fixtures the squad looks ahead to with interest are against Lancaster, Girgarre and Dookie United — so naturally, there’s a keenness to embrace the challenges ahead.
“Lancaster’s going to be hard to beat, but we just want to stay with them for as long as we can,” Cunningham said.
“We want to show that we’re hopefully in the mix with sides in the top half; they’re a good side, and we’ve talked a bit about that.
“We have identified a few strengths we think we’ve got, so we’ll be working on trying to execute those.”
For the time being though, there are plenty of aspects worth celebrating following this dominant result.
“We’ve had some ins and outs throughout the first four games, so yesterday was our first chance to play together and settle,” Cunningham said.
“We’re still in that phase of just trying to figure out all of our strengths as a squad, but yesterday felt like we pulled it all together.”
Further north on Saturday, there was relief at Stanhope as the Lions got off the mark for 2024.
The A-grade Lions earned their first win of the campaign in a tight 39-36 victory over Avenel, who forfeits the finals position it was occupying to Murchison-Toolamba as a result.
Lancaster and Violet Town continue to serve as the pace-setters at the official conclusion of round four, with Girgarre, Nagambie and reigning premiers Shepparton East four points adrift.
At the bottom of the table, Undera has yet to register a win either in A-grade netball or senior football this year, while fellow 0-4 outfit Rushworth remains anchored to the bottom of the table.
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