Quad Series Tournament
21st July 2023
This past weekend Netball Scotland hosted a quad tournament which saw Scotland A, Northern Ireland Warriors, Scotland U21s and Highland Fever go head-to-head in a series of competitive match play at the Emirates Arena.
The quad tournament gave our pathway athletes the opportunity to test themselves against a strong opposition in both Highland Fever and Northern Ireland Warriors. Performance Director, Karen Atkinson explained the benefit of providing this competition for our pathway players.
“The Quad Tournament provides us with the ideal opportunity to expose a greater number of our players to international standard competition. We wanted to ensure that our Thistles, Scotland A and U21 athletes that are not part of the World Cup squad also had a competition to prepare for over the summer. We are grateful to the Northern Ireland Warriors for travelling over, along with Highland Fever, who are making this competition meaningful and of a high standard.”
The competition exposed our pathway athletes to different styles of play. Coming up against the men’s team, Highland Fever, allowed our athletes to test themselves against a fast and strong opposition who bring a dynamic flare to the game. The Northern Ireland Warriors presented the opportunity to come up against some experienced internationals of the game, allowing players from both Scotland A and Scotland U21’s to demonstrate the pool of talent coming through the Scottish pathway. Performance Director, Karen Atkinson commented on the depth within the pathway,
“The exciting thing in Scotland is the talent now coming through our pathway. We have introduced new competitions and also a different way of approaching our National Pathway camps and it is having a positive impact on the standard of players coming through the system. The future is definitely looking bright for the Thistles and upcoming international cycles.”
Scottish Thistles Head Coach, Tamsin Greenway added,
“We’ve got a whole pathway coming through, you know, we’ve had Northern Ireland in this weekend to play against Scotland A and 21s and we’ve got like this whole group of players that are really, really exciting and that’s full credit to what Karen Atkinson the pathway coaches like Rachel Cremin are doing behind the scenes because we’re starting to create something really special, some special groups and special players and what I’d like this senior group to do is go out and sort of stamp their authority to show this next group coming through what it’s all about.”
Overall, it was a successful weekend for both of our pathway teams competing in the quad tournament. With different combinations tested out on court and progress building each game, the exposure of this competition will be key in the development of our pathway athletes. Scotland A finished with 3 wins from 3 and Scotland U21s had two highly contested games against Highland Fever and Scotland A before defeating Northern Ireland 53-41. Special thanks to all of the teams for taking part, our umpires and bench officials
