The UP-Tuks netball team ensured a home semi-final in the Varsity Tournament last night by convincingly beating UWC 87-46 in the Rembrandt Hall.
The victory means that UP-Tuks who lost their opening two games finished second on the log with 26 points. Kovsies who only lost one game tops the log. Madibaz is third also with 26 points however their goal difference is smaller. Maties is the fourth team to have qualified.
What made UP-Tuks performance against UWC remarkable is that quite a few of the players were in action during the World Student Championships in Uganda last week and had only arrived back on Saturday night.
However, being involved in a gruelling tournament spending hours in an aeroplane did not seem to faze them as it was the “jet-setters” who excelled proving there is truth in the saying about when the going gets tough the tough get going.
Tshina Madau seems to relish being the UP-Tuks captain. For the duration of the game, she was in the thick of things. Being one of the smaller players on court meant she got shoved around quite a bit, but she gave as good as she got. Defensively she was brilliant continually managing to disrupt UWC when they were on the attack. She deservedly got the Player of the Match reward.
Marlize de Bruin possibly played one of her best games ever as centre excelling as the playmaker to ensure a continuous flow of balls into the circle. To do so meant that she had to put her body on the line time and again.
If there is one thing, the coaches at UP-Tuks seem to have mastered it is to coach goal shooters to rarely miss. Last night it was Venetia Grobler who was unsung sinking goal after goal with clinical precision. She had a near 100% success rate in the first two quarters but admitted to losing a bit of focus in the third quarter. However, she managed to regroup towards the end of the game ensure again the numbers on the scoreboard kept on getting bigger.
Grobler is hesitant to claim that she had a good game.
“There is always a margin for improvement when you play goal shooter. My biggest drive is to try and achieve a 100% record whether or not that will ever be possible remains to be seen.”
Grobler is currently only standing in for Ine-Mari Venter who is part of the Proteas team. Chanté Louw who was last year one of the stars of the UP-Tuks team is unfortunately not available to play this time around.
The role Chantelle Swart and Jeanette Vermeulen (goal attack) play in ensuring that the scoreboard keeps ticking over should not be underestimated.
UP-Tuks, who is the defending champions, is playing the Madibaz on Monday night (17:30) in the Rembrandt Hall. Kovsies and Maties are contesting the other Varsity semi-final.
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