Young student gets opportunity for international glory in touch rugby
A young student from Tukkies is on her way to Malaysia for the Youth Touch World Cup.
Touch rugby or ‘Touchies’, as this popular sport is commonly known among its participants, is one of the fastest growing sports in South Africa.
The sport derived from rugby football, but in this format players do not tackle each other. Instead they touch their opponents using their hands on any part of the body, clothing, or the ball.
Touchies also do not include elements such as scrums, rucks, mauls and line-outs. Play is mainly resumed through a tap-kick at the spot of an infraction like the ball going into touch, a knock-on or a forward pass.
Touch rugby’s simplicity makes the sport very popular as social activity and also as a method of staying fit. It requires very little equipment, it’s easy to master and injury risk is limited due to lack of contact during play.
As a result mixed-gender and women-only games are also very popular.
Savannah Bennett, a 19-year-old student from the University of Pretoria, is one of the local ladies who not only fell in love with this sport, but also performed so well that she now has the opportunity to participate against international opposition abroad.
Bennett is part of the national junior team called the SA Touch Boks who will soon leave for Malaysia to participate in the Youth Touch World Cup, which is organized by the Federation of International Touch.
This former pupil of Hatfield Christian School started playing Touchies in grade 9. Although she also excelled in hockey and athletics at school, she had already made her mark at a young age on club level in touch rugby.
As a schoolgirl she has already played on invitation for a Western Cape under-19 team in a national tournament and she was the youngest participant in senior leagues at Northern Touchies in Pretoria.
Bennett, a first-year Computer Engineering student, told Rekord that she had always been very sporty and that Touchies gave her the opportunity to express her love for action-packed sport while also enjoying the social cohesion associated with it.
She has also been considering 7’s rugby and she follows the success of Tuks’ women’s 7’s team with great interest.
For now, however, Bennett wants to enjoy her first trip overseas with a touch rugby team and hope to maybe be able to win a medal with the SA Touch Boks in Malaysia.
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