Pholosho bungled out of the McDonald’s tournament in last hurdle
ALEXANDRA - Pholosho Junior Secondary School bungled out of McDonald's U14 Schools tournament.
Pholosho Junior Secondary School may have failed to advance to the national championships of the McDonald’s U14 Schools Tournament, but they can hold their heads high with pride.
The school had three matches to play before they could qualify for the national championships of the competition which will be held at the end of September and beginning of October at the Lucas Masterpieces Moripe Stadium in Atteridgeville, Pretoria. Of the three matches, Pholosho won two and lost one. In their first game, they routed one of the best football academy schools in Gauteng, Rosina Sedibane 3–1 and went past another academy, Nationwide by 1–0.
In their last match at the Alabama Stadium in Klerksdorp, they needed the minimum of a draw and they would have qualified for the Gauteng final. A win would have been the cherry on top.
In that game, they met another champion academy, Clapham of Pretoria, and they were demolished 3–0. This shattered their dreams of making Alex history by being the first school from the impoverished township to reach the final of the prestigious tournament that is a legacy of the 2010 Fifa World Cup, which was held in South Africa and Africa for the first time.
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But despite the failure to qualify for the national finals, Pholosho made their kasi [township] proud by being the first school to reach the Gauteng finals. The pride is not only for the school and Alexandra but for the whole of the Joburg East District of the Gauteng Department of Education.
Team coach, Siyabonga Figlen heaped praises on his charges for a job well done. “We may not have qualified for the national finals, but the mere fact that we reached this stage of the competition and went on to beat some of the best and well-resourced football schools is an achievement worth celebrating.”
Figlen said his team was paired with well-resourced champion schools, compared to his, which has no ground to practise on, has no football equipment, kits, balls and other related items, and most of the team members come from unemployed or broken families. “Our opponents eat, sleep and dream soccer.
“They have all the best facilities and equipment one can ask for, including gyms, supplements and dieticians, all of which are pie in the sky for us.”
Figlen’s sentiments were echoed by team captain, Terence Moyo, who plays for the U15s of Black Poison in the Alex league. “We may have nothing in Alexandra but we possess the rare resource of talented footballers, and it’s no fluke that we got to this level of the tournament.” Although Moyo had wanted to go all the way to the national finals, one of the things he takes from the tournament heading to the Alex league is discipline and keeping a cool head all the time.
