After an unfavorable result in their opening game Maties have made great strides in the Varsity Hockey Challenge with a win and a draw against, arguably, two of the toughest opponents in the tournament.
It was difficult for the Maties girls to adapt in their first game against the hosts Pukke and the travel came back to haunt them in the last 20 minutes.
“The travel was the greatest impact on our performance in the opening game.
“We travelled 15 and a half hours to get to Potchefstroom and the girls ran out of steam in the last 20 minutes of the match,” coach Jenny King said.
The other two games that they played during the opening leg of the challenge were against Tuks and Kovsies – where they registered a draw against Tuks and beat Kovsies in a tightly contested fixture.
“Against Tuks we were unlucky and the ball just didn’t seem to get into the back of the net, but we played really well.
“It was a great result against Kovsies and the girls played great hockey to win that game,” King added.
With the potential travel fatigue, King has decided that they will do their travelling differently for the next leg in Bloemfontein.
“We are going to travel up to Johannesburg and then go through so we are there a day early,” she explained.
With the under-21 National Competition coming up King will be losing a number of her players but she is not too worried about this.
“Having the girls away does not really effect us but if they were to get injured then it would.
“The girls have got a week from the national tournament to the Bloemfontein leg of the competition and we will be careful to manage the players properly.
“There is a league game that we have to play on the Thursday of that week so we will be ready for Bloemfontein,” King mentioned.
The fixtures are piling up for the Maties girls and King mentioned an intinerary of 21 matches in the space of six weeks.
This schedule is going to be gruelling but it is a reality that a lot of the teams are facing with the introduction of a tounament like the Varsity Hockey Challenge.
The tournament starts again on May, 11 in Bloemfontein where the Maties go toe-to-toe with Western Cape rivals UCT.
