By John-Paul Moloney

In several of their recent matches, the Canberra Capitals have produced one poor quarter, which has made them vulnerable to defeat.

More often than not they've been strong enough to compensate, but coach Tom Maher doesn't want to see that period of weakness in Saturday's grand final against the Sydney Flames.

"We've shown in our last month that in the close games we've had, they've been due more to a team destroying us in one quarter, rather than building up a cumulative total," Maher said.

"It's been the one quarter that they've done the damage."

Against Adelaide earlier this month, the Capitals gave away most of a 16?point, quarter?time lead to be ahead by just four at half time.

The following week against Townsville, the Capitals were again sluggish in the second quarter, allowing their spirited opponents to lead by 16 points at half time.

On both occasions the team rallied to victory, but Maher wants a more consistent defensive effort against the talented and very experienced Flames.

"If we do things well over four quarters we can definitely keep our opposition to a losing score," he said.

"Then the question is can we produce a winning score."

Maher's main attacking weapon, Lauren Jackson, has recovered from the draining Townsville game and is likely to be much more than a handful for the Flames.

But she is not the only Capitals player capable of causing damage and to win, Sydney will need to stop players such as Kellie Abrams, Eleanor Sharp and Kristen Veal.

While Maher was confident in his team's ability to counter it's opposition, there were a number of strike players that the Capitals were training hard to contain.

"They're a fine basketball team, they have Belinda Snell and Natalie Hughes to watch and then they've got Shelley Hammonds, one of the players of the season," Maher said.

Maher predicted Saturday's match would be tight, particularly because Sydney had plenty of experience in finals.

"The thing with Sydney is they have tremendous experience in the finals and they've just gone through a couple of tough games which will steel them for the finals."