Russia continued their winning streak on Tuesday night at the women’s international water-polo tournament in East London when they trounced South Africa A 22-4 in the last of the first-round matches.
The South Africans looked strong early in the game, playing with determination and keeping the Russians at bay with the scoreboard reading a modest 3-1 in Russia’s favour at the end of the first quarter.
Although South Africa added an extra two goals in the second quarter — courtesy of Christine Haralambolis and Border girl Lee-Anne Keet — it was not enough to stay ahead of the powerful Russians, who took their score up to nine.
The last two quarters saw the game slip steadily away from the South Africans, with Russia adding five and eight goals to their tally in the third and fourth quarters respectively, countered only by a single third-quarter goal by hard-working Tammy Heydenrych.
The well-drilled and super-fit Russian team have dominated the tournament so far, convincingly winning all their matches. The South Africans were at a disadvantage, relative to the Russians, in terms of all-round readiness for the tournament, maintains coach Brad Rowe. The squad are also short on international experience, Rowe said.
”On the other hand, the Russian squad live together and train every day, playing against top-class international opposition on a regular basis,” said Rowe.
Opportunities for South Africa to compete with international teams are currently very scarce, though this may change if they get the nod to compete in the European B Championships next year.
In other games of the day, South Africa B went down 3-6 to South Africa Under-20 in a hard-fought contest, while an evidently tired Swedish team played a lacklustre game and were defeated 4-10 at the hands of Australia.
Russia come up against Sweden in the first of Wednesday’s semifinals, while South Africa A meet Australia in the second.
South Africa beat Australia 9-7 in the first round, so they will be confident of a win, which will put them into Wednesday night’s final against probably the Russian side, considering their 35-7 mockery of Sweden earlier in the tournament.
In the men’s interprovincial tournament, running alongside the women’s tournament, KwaZulu-Natal and South Africa Under-20 battled it out in a titanic encounter, with the scoreboard reading 6-6 at the end of the game. Central Gauteng’s game against Eastern Province/Border was a completely different story, with Gauteng amassing 22 goals against Eastern Province/Border’s four. — Sapa