Maties and UWC take the honours

Maties beat Kovsies in extra time of their thrilling Sevens final, while the UWC beach volleyball team maintained their unbeaten status with a tight 37-36 victory over UJ on the beach.

Although they were knocked out in the semifinals by Maties, UJ did get some consolation as two of their players walked away with individual awards.

Speedster Leon Potgieter got the Cell C Most Tries of the Tournament which saw him take away a R500 Cell C voucher and a Samsung Galaxy S4 and his team-mate Zane Janse van Rensburg took the Samsung Super Try award for his amazing try against Pukke on Sunday to claim the same prize.

The Maties Sevens side lost just one game all weekend, but they did not have everything their own way in a tournament that challenged all of the teams to adapt to the extremely windy conditions.

They looked in control of their final against Kovsies, last year’s runners-up, but a try in the final seconds of normal time by the Bloemfontein team sent the game into sudden-death extra time.

There was a further twist as two yellow cards saw Kovsies reduced to just five players, and Maties took advantage by going over for the decisive try.

In the third-place play-off, UP-Tuks steamrollered UJ, and NWU-Pukke claimed the Plate title by beating local favourites 20-10.

UWC’s Freddie Muller was named FNB Player-of-the-Tournament, earning him R1 000, and Maties’ Josh Bassingthwaighte was the Steers Most Valuable Player, which landed him a R500 voucher from Steers.