Lightning fine-tune form in clashes

Goal shooter Cara Koenen says there's an air of confidence amongst the Lightning's roster as they finalise preparations for the Super Netball season.

Lightnings Cara Koenen,. Picture: AAP - David Clark

NETBALL: Goal shooter Cara Koenen says there's an air of confidence amongst the Lightning's roster as they finalise preparations for the Super Netball season.

The Sunshine Coast outfit defeated Giants and lost to Adelaide Thunderbirds during pre-season fixtures over the past two days in Sydney.

They were the club's final battles against Super Netball squads prior to the season-opener at the end of April.

Koenen said the matches had revealed plenty of areas that needed fine-tuning and further reaffirmed versatility as a key asset for the club.

"It was great and we got to run out a few different combinations which is always nice in pre-season matches,” she said.

"We do have a lot of players who can play across more than one position so we definitely have been using it (pre-season games) as an opportunity to see what we can do across a few different combinations on court.

"It does give the coaches a lot to think about when looking at the starting seven and I think that we should really be proud of the fact that we are all competing for those spots on court and it's all pretty dead even at the moment.”

She believed the matches down south had been yet another sign that the hard work put in at training was paying off and it had been a boost to mindsets.

"I think there's a real sense of confidence in the group that we've got this year and we've put in a lot of hard work in the pre-season,” she said.

"(Even though) we've had people in and out with international (commitments) we've really done a lot of work in conditioning in the gym to get our strength up so we're ready to take on those big girls in Suncorp Super Netball.”

Lightning still have plenty of other chances to put their skills to the test in the next few weeks. "We've got a few games organised with men's teams at training and the Territory Storm ANL team so there's definitely a few more opportunities,” Koenen said.

Originally published as Lightning fine-tune form in clashes