Gryffe’s two-point victory ends AHS hopes
The AHS netball team took part in the semi-final of the Scottish Schools Netball Cup on Monday, narrowly losing out to eventual champions Gryffe High School, from Renfrewshire, in the match held in Aberdeen.
Gryffe High School 43, AHS 41
The game started with a fast pace and good attacking movements from the away side meaning they pulled ahead by four goals in the first stages of the game. AHS managed to settle, working hard to take the score back to level as the first quarter whistle blew.
Both teams had the urge and fight to win and this was evident going into the second quarter with end-to-end play and good consistent shooting from both sides. Gryffe High School had the edge and pulled ahead to finish at half time with a score of 24-22.
AHS came out determined after a clearly motivational chat at half time, going straight on to win the first two centres with great interceptions from Inga Woods. This meant the pressure was on and scores were level again. Sophie May Leyland continued to work hard moving the ball from defence to attack effectively and feeding well into the shooters. Despite hard work by AHS, Gryffe had managed to pull the score back in their favour to 36-34 at the end of the third quarter.
Going into the final quarter both teams had everything to play for and displayed good spirited but determined play. Ava Sim and Christine Jamieson were shooting just as consistently as their Gryffe counterparts. Gryffe, however, managed to maintain their lead to win a tense and very thrilling final 15 minutes, final score 43-41.
Gryffe progressed on to this year’s final in Linwood against Duncanrig, which was played on Tuesday and won by four goals to take the schools title.
A spokeswoman for the Shetland team said: “The AHS team should be very proud of their performance on the day and throughout the competition this year. To be placed in the top four schools in Scotland is an outstanding achievement.
“It is also excellent to see the standard of Shetland junior netball matching that of the level played on the mainland, despite competitions like this being so much less accessible to us. All credit should be given to players and coaches involved in junior netball throughout Shetland.”
