Pukke and Tuks clash for top spot

Old rivals, NWU Pukke and UP-Tuks will only have victory on their minds when they square off in the neutral venue of Stellenbosch this Sunday, 18 September.

Excellent teamwork, vibrant team chemistry and a hard-working team ethic have taken NWU-Pukke to three wins out of three in this year’s Varsity Netball tournament. Their most recent 58-36 win against UFS-Kovsies this past Monday was by far their most dominant performance against a quality team.

Pukke looked in complete control for the entire match with slick passing, mercurial positioning, accurate shooting and rock- solid defence typifying their game. Romé Dreyer, Mandy Hermanus and Zandré Kruger have all performed brilliantly for Pukke with each player getting a player of the match award thus far.

An ominous sight for the other teams is that the current title holders now also have Protea stars, Sigi Burger and Renske Stoltz on attack to keep the points flowing.

They were back to their best against Kovsies and it will take  some serious defending to stop them in their tracks this season.

Pukke’s next match on Sunday will most arguably be their toughest against an also rampant UP-Tuks team that is currently in first place on the log with a full house of 15 points after three matches. Pukke is currently second with 14 points, having picked up one fewer bonus point.

Tuks has completed victories over Maties, Kovsies and UCT in a comprehensive fashion with Lenize Potgieter, Melissa Kotze and Ina-Marie Venter being the biggest attacking threats.

Pukke will also need to keep a lookout for Tuks centres, Marlize de Bruin and Shongile Hlongwane. The latter has had a great start to her season, picking up a player of the match award against UCT.

Tuks vice-captain, Tshina Mdau is another player who Pukke cannot underestimate. One of Tuks’s great threats is their ability to win games out of nowhere.

NWU Pukke captain, Chanté Bester, is confident that Pukke can overcome Tuks and feels that hard work and good rhythm will be important to beat the Pretoria powerhouse.

“Our preparation for Tuks will be to get as much out of our practice sessions as possible. We need to focus on what we can improve,” said Bester. She also admitted that the team needs to keep their rhythm for the full 60 minutes.  “We need to be constant in all the quarters and be able to use all 12 players in our team and not just our seven starting players,”she explained.

The match will start at 16:00 and is live on Supersport 210.

Photos: SASPA.