Banyana coach Ellis happy with first training session in New Zealand

With all the Banyana Banyana players in camp in New Zealand ahead of the Fifa Women’s World Cup, the squad had their first training session on Sunday.

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Banyana will play a friendly match against Costa Rica on Saturday, with the tournaments set to kick off on 20 July. And coach Desiree Ellis (right) is happy what she has seen from the
players.

Having travelled a distance of over 11 000km from South Africa, Ellis says the players have slowly recovered from jet lag and she is happy that they got to touch the ball.

“I think the session went well, it was really good to get on the field and start the session. Everyone looked really enthusiastic, which was really good.

“We worked on trying to get as many touches of the ball as we could with the training that we did. We were happy with everyone back in training. In South Africa we had some players (that) had a long layoff,” said the Banyana coach.

“The jet lag is slowly but surely getting better. I think a lot of players have really settled and got used to trying to stay awake as long as they can so that their sleeping patterns are not disturbed.

“Especially the first group that came, I think they are a little bit further ahead of others (in adjusting). But everyone looks fresher in the morning, so that’s really good.”

Having to acclimatise to the weather conditions, Ellis said it was good that they left South Africa during winter and that will make things easier for the team to adjust to the conditions.

“The rain has come a little bit early, which is good for us – to be able to train in the rain as well as the cold. Their winter (New Zealand) is already starting. But it’s something we expected, it was really cold back in South Africa at times and we needed to get used to it.

“But I think the weather conditions are slightly different. We also had to manage the recovery in between the jet-lag.

“But the players know they have to push through a bit of fatigue.”

The friendly between Banyana and Costa Rica will be played at the Ngu puna Wai Sports Complex in Christchurch.