Joy Ndlela

209503293@ukzn.ac.za

The Hockey Nationals Under 21s Tournament was held in Cape Town this year and six teams were invited to participate: Tuks A & B teams, Namibia, Northwest, PENS, KZN coastal and KZN Inland. Zamambo Mkhiza of the KZN Inland team had this to say about the trip to Cape Town, “It was fun and the team had a spirit of camaraderie as I finally got to know members of my team better.”  The team, which is lead by coach Devon Van de Merwe and manager Wendy Manual, were invited as underdogs of the tournament and they proved to be so as they lost every match they played, placing them last in the tournament. She says, “We were expected to lose by large margins of 8-0 or more, but we held our own with our worst being 7-0 and our best losing only by a goal to nil.” She continued to say that “… the coaches from the other teams said that this year’s KZN Inland team was the strongest they had seen.” When asked about how far she wants to take her hockey playing, she answered “I want to take it as far as I can, I love hockey and I plan to continue playing it, but I don’t see myself turning it into a career.” After the week long tournament Zama packed up and came back home, to another match on Friday 6^th of May against Northwest. She plays for UKZN’s 1st team and unfortunately they lost the match 3-0 in the last ten minutes of a game that was an even contest. Cilia an ex UKNZ 1^st team player, who moved to Northwest for her hockey skills was “the worst of them all to defend” as she dominated, creating most of the goals. The referring went against the girls in these last minutes, which caused them to get frustrated and drop their heads leading to the flurry of goals.