Aussie Stingers into bronze medal play-off

The Aussie Stingers unfortunately weren’t able to hold off the USA who are looking to take their third consecutive World title. They will now face Hungary on Friday 26 July at 6:00pm AEST for the bronze medal playoff. 

Aussie Stingers Assistant Coach, Rebecca Rippon, said despite the score-line the Aussies delivered a good defensive game. 

“There were a couple of goals let in that we shouldn’t have, but we were happy with our defence," she said. “In the second half we were a bit more aggressive on attack. We will now watch the next semi-final and find out who our opposition will be and do an analysis on ourselves and them. We will look for areas to improve and fix them,"

The Aussie Stingers struggled to convert goals until the second half when Captain Rowie Webster blasted her 13th goal of the tournament. There was a further ten minutes with no goals recorded before Bronte Halligan produced a great goal to put the score at 2-6. But with just two minutes left on the clock there was little time for the Aussie Stingers to recover. While the scoreline didn’t go the Stingers way, their ability to keep the world’s best team to only one goal a piece in the final two quarters shows the strong defensive abilities of the team. 

Quarters: 3-0, 2-0, 1-1, 1-1

AUSTRALIA: Gabriella Palm, Keesja Gofers, Hannah Buckling, Bronte Halligan, Isobel Bishop, Bronwen Knox, Rowie Webster, Amy Ridge*, Zoe Arancini, Lena Mihailovic, Elle Armit, Madeleine Steere, Lea Yanitsis*. Head Coach: Predrag Mihailovic.

*Denotes UNSW-Wests Killer Whales player

This article originally appeared on the Water Polo Australia website