Ireland played Canada: a one-sided affair, as Ireland played as a team right from chukka one. They didn't make the mistakes that Canada made. Ireland kept the ball off the ground with good passes. After chukka 1, it was 5-1 in favour of Ireland. In commentator Jim Callinan's words: "The Irish ladies started to bake a tasty cake", which translates to the ladies were scoring. Irish men won chukka two, and from then on it was all one-way traffic, with great team effort from all players.

Ireland team representative – James Smyth said, “It was a great game, Canada put up a good fight and there was always pressure on. A great team performance from both sides.”

Lesley Plant – Canadian team representative said, “We came out expecting a fight and seemed to switch on in the latter part of each chukka. It was wonderful and we were very pleased with our ball handling skills. As it is our off season, we don't have any ground to practice on, our last outside game was in October. We've been practicing in arenas, so playing under lights won't be a worry."

The experts predicted this would be a close match – and were proved right. Throughout the game, neither side led by more than two goals with each taking the lead on a number of occasions. Initially, the UK women tore ahead led by their No 1 Shelley King who is one of the best players from any team in the tournament. However, the USA men turned the tables immediately, playing an unchanged combination of skipper Rob Shuttles, Ryan Trueblood and Ryan Murphy throughout the match.

With the women back on the park, the unchanged UK side of King, Debbie Harris and Sarah Simkin again took their side to the front. This see-saw continued until the last chukka when the UK men (Guy Robertson, Hamish Michael and Martin Brookes) finally sorted out their USA opponents and ran away with the match by five goals.

Guy Robertson , UK player – said, “if the spectators thought they were nervous, it's even harder playing, our nerves were huge! We knew if we won this game we'd be in the semi finals and we knew the USA would come out hard and they did. The USA has very good horses and we knew we had to look out for them. We would just like to thank the Australian people for loaning us their horses to play at this level, it's incredibly generous. I'm sure we'll all do the same when you come to the UK in 2011 for the next World Cup.”

Wendi Hendricks , USA No 2 – said, “they were great sports and I'd like to mention the umpiring, it was incredible. We came out tough knowing the UK would do the same, as it was a very important game for both of us. We kept the first rotation of women for the first 2 chukkas and changed the last, trying to stay as strong as we could. The horses are phenomenal and we're really starting to get along with them now. Australian, Joy Poole our coach, has taught us that the horse is the most important part of the game – take care of them and they'll take care of you.”

In this, the first of our international night games, Australia got off to a flying start, with Kylie Dowling throwing 5 goals to Zimbabwe 's 1 goal in the first chukka. The Australian ladies continued to dominate the Zimbabwe combination throughout, until chukka 5, when Ashley Panter for Zimbabwe threw 3 goals to level the chukka with Australia .

Troy Henry, riding Future Miracle, was outstanding in chukka 2, however the fourth chukka saw Zimbabwe 's Shannon Burbidge outscore Australia 3-1. This mid-game fight back was short lived after Aaron Clarke changed to the number 1 spot and threw 6 goals in the sixth chukka to seal a convincing win.

Tanya Hollow, Australian captain said, “Ross Shepherd, our coach always has a plan, but all the options we have allow for flexibility. The atmosphere tonight was electric. However the lights can cause problems when catching a ball up high. It was a good team effort, Aaron Clarke had a brilliant last chukka.”

Zimbabwe player Frances Dodd said; “it was so exciting playing under lights the horses were more nervous than in the last couple of games due to all the lights, flags and crowd. Australia's Kylie Dowling was just terrific, at one stage when in the goal scoring area she lost one rein, but went on to score the goal anyway. It is always really exciting to play with Kristen my sister, we all really enjoyed the game, it was fun. But we didn't get it all together.”

On a crisp clear night in front of an enthusiastic crowd, New Zealand played South Africa under lights and did it have some highlights! It was a very even game until the fifth chukka where the New Zealand ladies skipped away and lead 13-9. The men came out in the last and final chukka and SA put on 4 quick goals and tied it up 13 all. In the dying moments of chukka 6 Charl du Plessis had the chance to steal victory, but he missed the goal. The ladies came back on for golden point and it was the lady Casey Mullany, who was the hero of the evening and took it out for the Kiwis 14-13. This has been the closest game of the Ridley Polocrosse World Cup to date.

Shane Hill, New Zealand No.3 said, “we are here to win, New Zealand can do it! It took a few minutes to adjust to the lighting, but once we got used to it playing was ok. The game was played in a great spirit. We were impressed in Charl's hand eye coordination. We would like to thank all the NZ supporters for the messages of encouragement.”

Gavin Cocker, Captain for South Africa said, “we look to improve in our next game. For someone so young, Dawnay played a fantastic game; she coped very well under pressure. What a spectacular game, I agree with Shane it was played in very good spirits.”