The Eastern Cape will send six teams to the nationals of the DStv Schools Netball Challenge (DSNC) Nationals that are set for 8-9 August in Johannesburg.
Youth Day saw 16 Botho and Ubuntu schools come together to vie for the top three positions available to progressing to the final stages of the competition. The group stages saw the schools play against each other before they branched off to play in their different stream.
Despatch High School, Pearson High School and Hoërskool Grens have qualified in the Botho division while kwaZakhele High School, Humansdorp Senior Secondary School and Ngangelizwe Senior Secondary School will play in the Ubuntu stream.
Eastern Cape Schools Netball secretary Satara Ferreira says they are satisfied with how the competition went.
“It was a wonderful day with teams coming all over the Eastern Cape. It was a day marked with players celebrating their talents, celebrating their achievements and just growing as netball players and as people. Thank you to our officials for helping make the day a wonderful success as well as our coaches for preparing their teams. The day was a wonderful success and it was enjoyed by everybody,” says Ferreira.
Free State netball is also sending six schools to the nationals. C&N Sekondêre Meisieskool Oranje in Bloemfontein was the venue where 12 schools competed for a chance to represent the province at the nationals.
Also held over two days, 16 and 17 June, the schools were divided into three pools, two Botho and one Ubuntu with eight and four schools respectively.
Sekondêre Meisieskool Oranje, Hoërskool Sentraal and Bethlehem Hoërskool Voortrekker have qualified in the Botho division while Teto Secondary School, Ikaheng Zakheni Secondary School and Thakameso Comprehensive Secondary School will represent the province in the Ubuntu section.
The schools had to first battle in their respective groups and the top two schools in the Botho pools proceeded to play in the cross semifinals the schools that finished in the top three in the final round moved to the nationals. While the Ubuntu teams played against each other in a round robin format in their group the teams that finished from first to third progressed to the final round.