The Delta Drone Tuks women’s seven team qualified to play the FISU World Rugby Cup in Russia next year after winning the Kings of Africa University Rugby Sevens tournament in Kampala.

The UJ’s team won the men’s competition beating Maties 14-10 in the final.

The Tuks women’s head coach, Riaan van der Merwe, is very proud of his team, after he and his management had to plan carefully to achieve this goal.

“The Covid Pandemic made things genuinely challenging over the last 22 months. Usually, from last year to now, we would have played at least ten international tournaments. But due to the pandemic restrictions, we hardly got to play. The last time we played an ‘international game’ was in February 2020. Tuks played against the University of Bordeaux at home,” Van der Merwe said.

What complicated things even more for Van der Merwe and his team, is that they lost many of the senior players who in the past has helped Tuks to beat the national teams of other countries. So, the challenge was to scout for new talent and then get them to understand the finer intricacies of the game.

“That is why I am so excited about what we have achieved over the weekend. The team made up for what they lacked in experience with pure guts in the tournament. Everyone really put their bodies on the line. These heroics led to quite a few serious injuries. By the time we got to play the last game, we only had ten players left who could still take to the field,” Van der Merwe explained.

According to Van der Merwe, the Covid Pandemic impacted the women’s tournament as many teams withdrew. In the end, only Tuks, UJ and the Makerere University from Uganda entered. So, it was decided the women’s tournament would be contested on a round-robin format.

“The rules also changed. It was decided that the team with the best points difference would be the overall winner. So, I have told the players to go for ‘maximum’ when we play against Makerere University. They did. We won the first game 25-0 and the second 34-0. The scores were not quite a true reflection of what happened on the field. The Makerere ‘girls’ relish any opportunity to go for big tackles,” he remarked.

Both their games against UJ were humdingers. Tuks won the first 7-5 while UJ got the better of them in the second game, winning 10-5. But because Tuks had the better point difference, they ended up being the tournament winners.

“Our captain, Sesihle Maguga, impressed with the way she led by example, even after injuring her wrist. Kirsten Eastes was, without a doubt, Tuks’s best forward. Our ‘Iron Lady’ Miche Pretorius might be one of our smaller players, but it is not always size that matters. Despite taking some hard hits, she kept on running hard every time she had the ball in her hands,” said Van der Merwe.

His reference to “Iron Lady” has to do with Pretorius also being a passionate triathlete.

If nothing unforeseen happens, Van der Merwe hopes that the Delta Drone Tuks team will play in Dubai in December. The South African 100m record holder, Carina Horn, might just play for Tuks. If she does, she will definitely be one of the fastest in Dubai. There are not many sevens players who can claim to have run a 100m sprint in 10.98s.

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