In the first full post-Covid-19 season, the u.14A netball team of Hoërskool Generaal Hertzog  (HGH) upset the apple cart – locally, within the province, and nationally.

Often underestimated, these players set out at the start of the season, determined to improve and prove that HGH can compete against the ‘big guns’.

Being the fiercely competitive group of girls they are, they tackled each game intending to improve on the last – developing them into the netball machine they became

This tenacious group of girls went through the season unbeaten and took the top prize at the

Mpumalanga Schools Netball Championships, claiming scalps like Hoërskool Middelburg and Hoërskool Nelspruit along the way.

This shocked the netball community, as it has been years since a local team claimed the top prize in the province.

Being provincial champions, the team qualified for the South African Schools Netball Championships, hosted in Boksburg – competing against the 36 top netball schools in the country.

These girls were drawn in the pool of death – using a football reference. They had to compete against perennial netball superpowers Oranje Meisies  (Free State champions) and Hoërskool Noordheuwel (one of the Gauteng juggernauts).

To put this into context – Oranje Meisies, being an all-girl school, has well over 2 000 girls enrolled at their school and Hoërskool Noordheuwel is considered a macro school.

With only two teams progressing to the knock-out stages of the tournament from each pool, the team treated every match as if it were their last.

They probably caused the biggest upset of the tournament by defeating Oranje Meisies in their opening game.

This sent shockwaves through the netball fraternity, as Oranje was seen as a medal favourite.

They made the country sit up and take notice. Losing very narrowly to Noordheuwel in their last pool match – they had to take their first loss of the season on their chin, but qualified for the knock-out stages of the tournament.

They met tournament favourites Helpmekaar College in the knock-outs – losing a very hard-fought match and thus being eliminated from the tournament.

This team dusted themselves off and left the national tournament ranked ninth in the country – a momentous achievement.

They have already started to prepare for the 2023 season and are singularly motivated to improve on their successes this year.

When asked what their goal for the 2023 season was, one word came in unison – gold!

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