Zandile Njeza was excited to welcome her Eastern Cape Aloes netball side to a practice at the Extension Six Indoor Sports Centre on Tuesday evening 27 May.
Zandile Njeza was excited to welcome her Eastern Cape Aloes netball side to a practice at the Extension Six Indoor Sports Centre on Tuesday evening 27 May.
Njeza said the Aloes were the first side to practice on the newly built netball court, adding that management and players were all impressed with the facility.
She said that the side’s management were interested in holding more practice sessions at the centre, which is almost halfway for most of the members who are based in Port Elizabeth and East London.
Njeza has been part of the Eastern Cape team for many years, also making the National team in 2003.
For this year’s team selection, Njeza travelled to Port Elizabeth for the trials.
A team was selected to take part in a Quin netball series in Fort Hare, which the Eastern Cape side won.
From there more trials were held in April, before a team was selected for the Eastern Cape side, which is currently taking part in the Brutal Fruit Netball Cup, with games played across the country and televised on SuperSport.
While the Eastern Cape side is still to win a game in the Brutal Fruit Netball Cup, Njeza said the Eastern Cape team’s challenge was getting together for practices.
She said most of the team was made up of members from Port Elizabeth and East London, who worked full-time.
Njeza said many of the other provincial teams are based in the same town or from the same university so they are able to practice up to three times a day.
The team is, however, still motivated and are ready to win the rest of their Brutal Fruit Netball Cup fixtures, she said.
The Eastern Cape team travels to Pretoria this weekend, for week four of the tournament fixtures.
The Aloes face Free State Crinums at 5.30pm on Saturday 31 May and then face North West Flames at 3pm on Sunday 1 June.
