Queens Hit Glasgow Target While Malawi Looked AwaY

The Malawi Queens wrapped up their group stage at the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow on Thursday morning with a 55-49 victory over Tonga at the OVO Hydro. It was a proper contest, fought quarter by quarter, and it deserved more attention back home than it got.

While most of the country was glued to the Malawi Scorchers' campaign in Morocco, the Queens were quietly doing what they have always done: competing, grinding, and representing this country at the very top of the international netball calendar. The two stories were running at the same time. Only one was trending.

Tonga drew first blood, taking the opening quarter 15-14. The Queens steadied, led 29-26 at half-time, then held on through a tight third quarter, 14-13, and sealed the fourth 12-10 to win by six goals. It was not comfortable. Tonga made them work for every single point.

Captain Takondwa Lwazi drove the side through the difficult passages, and veteran shooter Mwai Kumwenda provided the clinical finishing when it counted. Head coach Deborah Fuller had made one change to the starting line-up from the Australia game, bringing in Mphatso Banda for Melia Soko, according to Times of Malawi match coverage.

The Queens ended the group stage with two wins from five matches, having also beaten Northern Ireland 64-48 earlier in the tournament. They lost to South Africa (65-44), world-ranked number one Australia (68-32) and England (73-38). Those three defeats ended any semi-final hope early, but they were playing the best teams in the world. That context matters.

The win booked them a 7th/8th place playoff against hosts Scotland, and the Queens subsequently beat Scotland 54-47 to finish seventh overall, matching the position they claimed at Birmingham 2022. The Netball Association of Malawi had set a top-seven finish as the explicit target for Fuller before the tournament began. Target met.

The Queens are Malawi's most decorated sporting side on the international stage. That record was built through years of consistency at tournaments exactly like this one, in pools exactly this competitive. A generation of young debutants, including Stella Matelezi, Ethel Ng'ambi and Sophie Banda, also announced themselves in Glasgow against some of the world's best. That matters for the future.

Football deserves its noise. But so does this. The Queens went to Glasgow, competed in the hardest netball group at the Games, and came home with seventh place. Malawians should know that.