This year’s USSA will be taking place at the University of Johannesburg and the University of the Witwatersrand from 1 – 5 December 2014.

TuksCricket will be competing against Pukke, UJ, Kovsies, Madibaz PE, UWC and Ikeys in this year’s ‘A’ secion and the fixtures for TuksCricket will be as follow:

Monday 1 December: Assupol TuksCricket vs Kovsies at the Walter Milton A Oval

Tuesday 2 December: Assupol TuksCricket vs UJ at the UJ Soweto Campus Cricket Oval

Wednesday 3 December: Assupol TuksCricket vs NWU Pukke at the UJ Main Oval

Thursday 4 December: Play offs – TBD

Friday 5 December: Play offs – TBD

The top 8 teams in this tournament will qualify to take part in the Varsity Cricket week in Potchefstroom from 2 – 8 February 2015. The winners of the Varsity Cricket week will then represent South Africa in the Red Bull Campus Cricket World Finals which will take place in India in 2015.

The Assupol TuksCricket Head Coach, Pierre de Bruyn, said, “This year we have a very well balanced squad and most of these players took part in the Red Bull Campus Cricket World Finals in London in July. There is definitely a good balance between young and experienced players in the squad. Aiden Markram will captain the side and he has shown great leadership qualities in all aspects of the game after being named the Assupol Tuks 1 captain for the season. Aiden was the SA u19 captain during the ICC u19 World Cup in February where the team became the first ever South African cricket team to win the World Cup. He was also in the TuksCricket team that represented South Africa at the Varsities World Cup where South Africa came out victorious therefore being in two World Cup winning sides in one year.”

de Bruyn further said, “ I feel that the credibility of the USSA tournament has now been lifted as it will determine the journey for the Varsity Cricket tournament. This means that the quality of cricket as well as the standard of cricket will be very good. This competition will also give every young player taking part a great opportunity to introduce himself as young upcoming talent in South African cricket.”

Aiden Markram, the Assupol TuksCricket Captain remarked, “I’m very excited for USSA this year as it is yet another opportunity for us as a team to take on the best student cricketers in the country. The team vibe feels fresh and the selected 14 players going are all awesome guys and we are all looking forward to the upcoming week.”

On being asked about his expectations for this year’s USSA, Assupol TuksCricket senior player, Heinrich Klaasen commented, “I’m expecting very strong competition from all the teams taking part as everyone wants to qualify for the Varsity Cricket competition next year. I’m really looking forward to the week because it is usually a tough competition and it tests a team’s mental toughness a lot as you need to play five days of competitive 50 over cricket.

I expect of our team to play our brand of cricket and to win USSA for the second year in a row. It is important that we execute our skills properly and that we perform better than any other team under pressure. Hopefully we can again get three or more players into the SA USSA team after this year’s tournament.”

The Assupol TuksCricket squad was announced this week:

Heinrich Klaasen (Captain)

Aiden Markram (Vice Captain)

Johan Wessels

Sean Dickson

Gerhard Linde

Ruben Claassen

Sean Nowak

David Mogotlane

Murray Coetzee

Bantu Dandala

Blake Schraader

Corbin Bosch

Dylan Ross-Watt

Nsovo Baloyi

Head Coach: Pierre de Bruyn

Assistant Coach: Chris van Noordwyk

Manager: Blanche Conradie

Trainer: Jarret Cocks

Physiotherapist: Lizahn Naude

Scorer: Nthabiseng Ledwaba