Southerns soar in Pietermaritzburg

Lindsey Carlisle must have been in two minds on Monday.

While she remained fully focused on her role as assistant coach for the South Africa Junior team at the Spar Interprovincial Women's Hockey Tournament, just an inkling of allegiance must still have been with the team with which she has won so many national titles, Southern Gauteng.

The two sides met on the second day of the tournament in Pietermaritzburg on Monday. And while the Juniors completely dominated the first 10 minutes of the encounter, Southerns' experience eventually saw them safely to a 3-1 win.

Despite the early pressure on their defence Southerns were the first to score, Pietie Coetzee converting a penalty corner in the 24th minute.

The Under-21s didn't take long to equalise, however, Cindy Brown scoring, also off a penalty corner, seven minutes later taking the score to 1-1 going into the break.

While the Juniors were still solid in the second half, their inexperience did start to show, allowing Southerns to score twice more, Coetzee again and fellow national player Nita van Jaarsveld doing the honours.

“It's always a hard thing to play against Southerns,” said Carlisle, who withdrew from the team as a precautionary measure because of a knee injury. “But I'm committed to the Junior team right now.

“To play Southerns was a good, hard challenge. This is excellent preparation for where we'll be three weeks from now (competing at the Junior World Cup in Chile) and that's the bottom line.

“I think we played well in the first half. The first 10 minutes were fantastic which was so nice to see because the Juniors have struggled to start in the past.

“It really was a great start but they let it slip as Southerns' experience kicked in.”

Giving a hint of what it might take to beat the seemingly invincible Southerns side, Carlisle added: “To beat them, like with any team, you need to put maximum pressure on every individual in the team and stifle them.

“It's a difficult one because they have some great players in their team.

“You've just got to play the game for the full 70 minutes. Obviously you go through highs and lows but in the lows you need to defend well and then capitalise on the highs and take your chances.”

Defending champions Western Province continued to work their way towards a probable final showdown with Southern Gauteng by easily defeating North West 4-0, thanks to a hat-trick from Henna du Buisson and a goal from Leigh Bierman.

KwaZulu-Natal recorded a comfortable 3-0 victory over Natal Midlands, while, after trailing 1-0 at half-time, Eastern Province claimed their first win of the tournament, beating Peninsula 2-1.

Northerns recovered from their thorough beating by the SA Juniors on day one of the tournament with a 7-0 win over Free State, while Witwatersrand beat Mynahs 2-1.