They may have lost their SEA Games netball round-robin match 54-49 to Malaysia despite holding an early lead, but it was a resolute Singapore team that left the Santa Rosa Sports Complex yesterday.
Captain Charmaine Soh rued the basic errors that were her side's undoing, but remains confident of overturning the result if both teams meet in Monday's final.
After the round-robin action, Singapore are second behind Malaysia and will face Thailand in the semi-finals tomorrow. Malaysia will meet Brunei.
"(Today's game) does matter to some extent but it's not a very crucial game. We know we'll pick ourselves up and come back stronger," said Soh. "We're not feeling the happiest because we know we haven't brought our 'A' game, but the whole team is confident (of beating Malaysia if we face them again)."
Singapore started strongly and built a 6-2 lead, but tightened up as their opponents levelled at 11-11 and won the first quarter 15-12.
Singapore, the 2015 champions and 2017 runners-up, trailed by as many as six goals in the next quarter and were behind 28-24 at half-time.
They came close to catching up after the break. But Malaysia, whose shooters barely missed, remained a step ahead even as their lead was down to a single goal several times.
While Singapore made untimely mistakes near the end, the defending champions remained steady to stay undefeated.
Singapore coach Natalie Milicich noted that despite those mistakes, there were positives to take away, including how her charges kept to the structures and their approach.
"Sometimes when we're under pressure and there's emotion around the game, we have to make good decisions at these critical moments," she said. "We've some strategies around making sure that when something goes wrong, we stay in the moment and try not to dwell on that. And I saw some players doing that today... I was very proud of how we pushed through."
The New Zealander believes her players have improved during the week, "reflecting on their performances" and "taking ownership of what we're doing out there".
She added: "As long as we continue to do that and stick to the task, we can turn the result around. I'm confident of that."
