Selborne College and Clarendon secure tough victories in mid-week encounters
As we reach the mid-year break, schools are slowly wrapping up their hockey fixtures to shift their focus on exams- However, there were some entertaining matches in the Eastern Cape this week with wins for Clarendon Girls and Selborne College in East London, while St Andrews defeated Kingswood College in the annual “K-Day” fixture.
Selborne College and Clarendon Girls both registered tough wins on the road against Stirling High School on Wednesday evening as both matches were played under the rain and in tough conditions.
Clarendon, who are the sister school of Selborne has had a similar run to their neighboring boys’ school this season, recording emphatic wins and beating a couple of strong teams on their way to the mid-season break.
They came into the Stirling game on the back of a (4-1) win against Cambridge whereas they had scored 14 goals against Kingsridge Girls High a week prior.
Reacting to the hard-fought 1-0 against Stirling, Clarendon’s head coach, Deon Nel told SuperSport Schools how delighted he was with the win, and feels like they played their best hockey
“I think it was a really good game for us, statistically, we were good the whole game, the only part that let us down was the finishing around the circle,” he said after the match.
“Anyways, we’ll take the win. I also think it was a very dominant performance even though we managed to get the goal in the dying seconds of the match.”
“We played some of the nicest hockey that we’ve played this season, moved the ball around a lot, I’m generally happy with the performance, it’s not always about the outcome but satisfied with the way we played,” added the coach.
Players that stood out: Claren Lugo- Fernandez, Cara Knott, while Stirling captain Linamandla Mxinwa also produced a top performance.
In the boys’ game, Selborne once again scored five goals in what Selborne coach, KJ Friend described as “Torrential Rain”.
The side was coming off a (6-1) win against Cambridge a few days ago. Among the scorers featured Cade Kock, who has come alive of late. Whereas regular goal scorers, Ben van der Merwe and Waeden Plaajies also scored to record yet another victory for the side away from home.
Across the province in Makhanda, Kingswood College hosted St Andrews in the annual K-Day derby.
Two teams, who have performed up to standard this season struggled to break each other’s defence early in the game.
It was probably one of the toughest and most tightly contested hockey matches in the Province to date. St Andrews scored the only goal of the match in the second half, with one quarter to go.
Captain, Sibusiso Mxube came up with the goal after pouncing on a loose ball in the box. That makes it two wins in as many matches for St Andrews after they defeated Queens College (2-0) last weekend.
Kingswood Girls vs DSG Makhanda will play on Saturday, while other schools have completed their hockey fixtures for the term.
Scorers:
Boys:
Selborne College 5 (Cade Kock (2), Ben van der Merwe, Waeden Plaajies, Jacques van der Merwe); Stirling 1 (Tristan Rowe).
St Andrew’s College 1 (Sibusiso Mxube). Kingswood College 0.
Girls:
Clarendon Girls High 1 (Kaylin Hendrick). Stirling 0.
