Westville Girls’ High School - May 6
The fiercely contested Highway Regional of the SPAR KZN School Girls’ Hockey Challenge takes place this year at Westville Girls’ High School astroturf on Sunday, May 6.
St Mary’s DSG, six times winners of this regional and three times winners of the Grand Finals of this highly-respected school girls’ hockey event, will be focussed on holding onto their title. Only once have the defending champs been ousted from their top position, and that was by Westville Girls’ High in the 2014 tourney at Thomas More College.
This year, Westville Girls’ High will host this regional, and will no doubt be using their home-turf advantage in their attempt to break the iron grip that St Mary’s has on this region.
Sian Tarbuton coach for host school, WGHS says that their team is hard at training and looking forward to the regional. “Our indoor season was a cracker,” she enthuses. “We were placed second in the logs, only losing to St Mary's with a narrow loss of 4-2. We were so close to getting a draw and then they scored against us in the last couple minutes. Our outdoor season got off to a great start. We won the Crawford La Lucia outdoor hockey tournament held over the April holidays. We won our pool and then met Crawford La Lucia in the final, winning the tournament. We won our first outdoor hockey match of the season against Thomas More College, so we have high hopes for the season, but need to keep our composure and work hard.”
Other schools participating in this six-school regional include Curro Hillcrest, Hillcrest High, Kloof High and Thomas More College.
The tournament starts at 8am, and will be played in a round robin format. Games last 23 minutes with a quick change over at 11 minutes. A win will earn a team 4 points, a draw with goals 2 points, a goalless draw 1 point and a loss 0. First and second places will then go head-to-head in a final match to determine the eighth regional team to go through to the Grand Finals at St Mary’s DSG in Kloof.
Other schools that have already secured their place at the Grand Finals are Ferrum Hoërskool from the Northern KZN Regional, newcomer Epworth School from PMB Central Regional, St Anne’s Diocesan from PMB Northern Regional, Durban Girls’ College from the Durban Central Regional, Amanzimtoti High School from the Durban South Regional and Our Lady of Fatima from the Durban North Regional.
For more info like the tournament’s Facebook page or follow the tournament on Instagram.