St Mary’s School hockey stars shine at international tournament
WAVERLY – The girls also participated in coaching clinics with German national coaches.
Two St Mary’s School Grade 10 learners in Waverley, Kristy Leonard and Josephine (Pepe) Sabio, have expressed their excitement about their recent trip to Europe to represent South Africa as part of an African all-stars team.
The two were selected along with 11 other girls for the overseas tour in January to participate in the tournament in Cologne, Germany.
The girls were selected after their indoor hockey PSI tournament in December last year 2019 according to the school. They represented their relative franchises at the PSI Tournament where selection took place.
The girls played in the All-Star African team which is made up of players from South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe and Botswana.
The team left South Africa in early January, for Europe and spent six days in Cologne playing against top German indoor teams and watched the German national team play. They also participated in coaching clinics with the German national coaches and explored the streets of Cologne.
“After six days in Cologne, we travelled to Maastricht, which is a small town near Amsterdam. We continued our journey to Amsterdam and played against a team called HC Tilburg at Bredaseweg,” Kristy and Josephine reflected.
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“This was our first time playing in a blow-up dome instead of an indoor hall which was very exciting. We visited one of the biggest and most popular clubs in Amsterdam called the Amsterdam Hockey Club where we had a training session with the Dutch national players and coaches. We also played against a team called Hurley.”
After 12 days of hockey and exploring, their tour came to an end. The girls said they had the most memorable experience, made many new friends, had plenty of fun and worked on their hockey skills.
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