UJ thrashes Alex Wolves at Pirates Grand Challenge
The teams met at Diggers Club where they competed in the Castle Lager Pirates Grand Challenge.
In what proved to be an exhilarating showcase of women’s rugby, the University of Johannesburg’s (UJ) women’s rugby team thrashed Alex Wolves at the Castle Lager Pirates Grand Challenge held at Diggers Rugby Club.
It was the team’s first game of the league and they left nothing to chance as they beat Alex Wolves 38–0.
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Head coach of the UJ seniors women’s team, Bongiwe Nhleko, said a lot is put in by the team to prepare for such matches. She said it’s a relatively young team and teaching them new techniques for them to ultimately display what they learned, is a huge thing for the University. Nhleko explained their focus, during these league games is development of new players, “Trying to build them and grow them so they are able to one day be part provincial and national teams.”
Through their many experiences the team has had, they have learned to not take any team lightly so there was no anticipation to win at such a high margin. Another attribution to this is are the coach’s thoughts on women’s rugby, “Women’s rugby has grown so much to the point where we cannot underestimate an single team. Alex Wolves has improved and the growth is awesome to see. So we didn’t anticipate such a big win, our intention was to just play as if it were final,” said Nhleko.
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The team also features five new players who Nhleko described as having been awesome to see play as they did. A standout player for her, however, was Siham Chtioui, as she displayed great improvement, only missing two conversions.
The team is now in preparation for what the coach envisages to be a very tough game against Pirates Rugby Club, who they had played in the finals last year, “I know they are coming back to want to prove a point, and claim back the trophy from us, but we in it to keep it.”
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