Netball Scotland U21s NWYC

The secret to getting top 8 in the world? A pre-competition pep talk from the one and only 'Olympian's Olympian' Dame Katherine Grainger DBE! The most decorated female British Olympian and Netball Scotland's Patron was guest of honour at the NS Annual Awards and was keen to share some advice with our University of the West of Scotland sponsored athletes ahead of them heading out to Botswana. A great evening was had by all, including the team's assistant coach Claire Brownie who picked up the Sirens Player of the Season Award! What a team!!

Well in the end that final challenge was just too big for our U21s, and despite an awesome battle to the end Uganda took the win and 7th place.
But having finished 17th in 2009 and 12th in 2013 we set our team the ambitious target of reaching top 8th and these guys did it! And what's more they did it in style, building the respect and admiration from fans of the sport across the globe. This is the most exciting young team our country has ever produced and it's all down to the hard work and efforts of the Netball Scotland staff and volunteers who have been working tirelessly behind the scenes for years to build a strong and progressive performance pathway.
Huge thanks to our incredible sponsors University of the West of Scotland for helping us to get here - we hope we made you proud.
And of course the biggest shout out goes to Lesley, Claire, Rachel, Elena and Bruce for leading and supporting this amazing team through the competition.
Bethany
Rachael
Bethan
Savannah
Rebecca M
Emma B
Rebecca E
Sarah
Emma L
Niamh
Kelly
Cat
Together you dreamed. You believed. And you most definitely achieved. 💜

T-1hr until we play Uganda for 7th/8th final placing. Who will reign victorious? We're backing SCOTLAND all the way!! Let's do this!
Watch via the livestreaming as our AMAAAAZING team play their final game of the competition 💪🏼💙💜💗

The team were lucky enough to spend a little time with the amazing teachers and children from Ithuteng Primary School who have adopted Scotland as their country to support throughout the competition. These wonderful children have greeted our athletes on arrival to Botswana, and have sung and cheered their way through every single one of our games. We absolutely love them and can't thank them enough for their incredible support these past 9 days. You all hold a special place in our hearts and we have made wonderful new friends for life! 💜💗

We can't quite believe it but our final game of the competition is tomorrow at 9am UK time against Uganda as we each battle it out for 7th place. Tune in to the live streaming and show our girls lots of support as they bring their fantastic NWYC2017 campaign to a close!

Our Netball Scotland U21s NWYC team are enjoying (might be a stretch of the word) some rest today after a gruelling competition schedule of 6 games in the last 7 days.

Tomorrow, is our team's last appearance at the Netball World Youth Cup Gaborone 2017 as they face Uganda in a final play off for 7th and 8th place. A big old game, but we are confident that the team will take on everything learned from their games so far and put it into play. You heard Catriona and Rebecca M in yesterday's interview, they want to go out with a win 💪🏼

We will be coming to you live on the YouTube channel at 9am tomorrow morning, so get those ⏰ set folks, get comfy and enjoy 💜💙 If you can't watch, then you can also check out our Twitter feed for live updates 👍🏻

proudly supported by University of the West of Scotland

What. A. Game. Our brilliant U21s started strong, only for the Jamaicans to step up a gear and go into the second half in the lead. But our girls were not going down without a fight and put out some outstanding performances to see that they won the second half. Unfortunately it wasn't enough to secure them the win but as they keep being tested against the best teams in the world they continue to rise to the challenge and show what they're made of. Well done girls. We are all so very proud of you! 💪🏼💜💗

In an hour's time we'll be taking on Jamaica in our 5th-8th place semi-final game. Tune in to the live streaming to watch all the action!