Wits land historic Varsity Netball berth after exciting USSA outing
- Tshepiso Mametela
The Wits first team netball side qualified for next year’s Varsity Netball tournament after capping off the 2021 University Sports South Africa (USSA) Netball Championships in seventh place.
The tournament was organised by the North West University’s Potchefstroom campus and hosted at the Camp Discovery game reserve, situated 60km north of Pretoria in the Dinokeng Conservation Area.
For Wits, the 2021 Telkom Netball League (TNL) first leg, held from 5 to 12 September in Pretoria, provided anything but an ideal preparation opportunity.
Marguerite Rootman, Wits’ first team head coach, who incidentally took charge of the KZN Kingdom Stars at the year’s TNL, reflected on the lack of an opportunity to mentor her regular starters, many of whom featured for opposing sides at the 12-team provincial tournament.
However, before the inter-University spectacle, the coach relished her team’s chances of qualifying for Varsity Netball for the first time in their history, having finished in 19th position at the 2018 event.
“Being a head coach in KZN did nothing for the Wits players' preparation. My challenge was to make sure that I got them [Wits team] a coach that had a similar coaching style to mine, who could stand in for me while I was away,” explained Rootman.
“Qualifying for Varsity Netball had been the goal since we moved up from the B division to the A division, and I think it was a realistic goal. But expecting to win the whole tournament would have been an unrealistic expectation.
“11 of the 12 players were 22-years-old and younger with three first-year students among them. Even my most senior player was only 24-years-old. Compared to the other Universities, who field 27-year-olds and have nine training sessions a week, we are not there yet but are working towards it.”
Panashe Chiranga, an explosive player and the team’s skipper, expressed that she had high hopes for her side ahead of the highly-billed tournament. She said she was chuffed with the overall performance and to finally land a Varsity Netball berth.
“I had high hopes for the team's performance this year. There's a lot of talent and there had been constant improvement throughout our preparation,” Chiranga observed.
“Having played with some of the opponents and analysing them from previous tournaments, we had accurate ideas of how to approach their playing styles on court while leaving room for adapting the game plan depending on what we were faced with,” she added.
“The biggest takeaway is, obviously, our entrance to Varsity Netball. It was [also] quite something to gauge our standing as a new team in a high-intensity division. But most importantly, it was just the opportunity to play the game we love.”