UP’s women’s team for the Varsity Football Tournament lost the final to UWC on 4 October. The game progressed until 70 minutes with neither team scoring. After entering a penalty shootout, UWC won 4-3. It is their first win in the tournament, having competed in the finals four times before.
Commenting on the Tuks team’s performance, TuksSport Director, Steven Ball, is “super proud”. He added that he has “not seen a Tuks ‘ladies’ team play football like this”. “The biggest thing is the character they showed. They never gave up. The players were fit and fast. That was all you wanted”, he said. The team coach, Maud Khumalo, also spoke of her team’s performance and encouraged them to “be proud of what [they] achieved”. She said that she is “over the moon” and that the “Tuks team is only going to get better”. Similar sentiments were echoed by team captain, Morongwa Manamela, who reflected on how
the team “grew in confidence with each game”.
While they missed the cup, UP did feature two team members as the FNB Player of the Match and FNB Player of the Tournament. Mmakhgotso Mashishi and Wendy Shongwe were awarded the respective FNB Players titles and Shongwe ended the match by noting that “losing the final is not the result we wanted, but still, I am proud of the way my teammates played to get us to the final”.
The final was the UP women’s team’s second tournament final and is unlikely to be their last. As the team captain Manamela says, UP is the “team that never gives up”.
Kayla is the Editor of PDBY for 2020 and 2021. She joined the copy team in 2017, and became head layout editor in 2018 before starting her term as Editor. Kayla is obsessed with PDBY and is considering moving into the office to live with Pssst... forever. You can reach her by email.
