{"id":40235,"date":"2024-04-05T06:52:36","date_gmt":"2024-04-05T04:52:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ssschoolsplus.co.za\/?p=40235"},"modified":"2024-04-05T06:52:36","modified_gmt":"2024-04-05T04:52:36","slug":"paarl-gim-dominates-pool-d-on-day-one-of-st-marys-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/?p=40235","title":{"rendered":"Paarl Gim dominates Pool D on day one of St Mary’s Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Paarl
Paarl Gim beat the St Mary’s Festival XI 3-0, which was one of three victories they recorded on day one of the St Mary’s Festival on Thursday.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Paarl Gimnasium<\/strong> was one of the two teams that remained unbeaten in Pool D at the end of the first day of action at the St Mary’s Hockey Festival <\/strong>in Johannesburg on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The Tanya Pieterse<\/strong>-captained outfit enjoyed a good start to their St Mary’s Festival campaign with a victory against the St Mary\u2019s Festival XI,<\/strong> whom they brushed aside 3-0. The Festival XI was an unfamiliar foe and coach Ian Naude’s<\/strong> team had to think on their feet and adapt to the challenge, which they did well.<\/p>\n

Their second match, against St Cyprian’s<\/strong>, was against opposition they knew well, and they planned accordingly. “We have played them before, a team from Cape Town, so we kind of knew what to expect. They are very attacking, and we sat back and sucked them in and went on the counterattack,” said Naude.<\/p>\n

The plan worked a treat and Paarl Gim finished the match with a 2-0 win.<\/p>\n

Naude and his team prepared well for the festival. They participated in two pre-tournament events which had a similar format to the St Mary’s Festival. However, it wasn’t smooth sailing for the Paarl team, with their preparations being hampered by injuries to key players, including Pieterse, who represented the SA u17 team at the Dato Mirnawan Cup<\/a> in Malaysia late last year.<\/p>\n

Paarl Gim’s ability to pull together as a team and be clinical with their passes belied the difficulties they had faced in the lead-up to the festival. Pieterse returned from injury and despite missing out on the pre-festival events, she marshalled the midfield with admirable aplomb. Their only weakness was in converting the chances they created. “Against St Cyprians, we created 10 chances and converted only a two. We need to do better in that part of our game,” Naude reckoned.<\/p>\n

In their last game of the day, they needed to convert only one chance to claim victory over St Stithians<\/strong>, and that is what they did.<\/p>\n

St Mary’s DSG, Kloof<\/strong>, was the other unbeaten team in Pool D. However, unlike Paarl Gim, their record wasn’t all wins. They drew 0-0 against Lance Louw<\/strong>‘s St Stithians. But that was preceded by a 4-0 success against St Cyprian’s in which St Mary’s showed off an attacking brand of hockey.<\/p>\n

The team from Kloof has yet to concede a goal in the festival, so far, and that is because of their solid defensive structure. That excellent defending helped them maintain clean sheets against St Stithians and Our Lady Fatima<\/strong>, whom they played later in the day, winning 1-0.<\/p>\n

“Our biggest flaw is that sometimes we dip in standards. I hope the girls play to their potential the whole tournament,” coach Carla Ann Mackay<\/strong> said.<\/p>\n

It is a handicap that Mackay hopes her charges will overcome as the festival progresses. Last year, St Mary’s finished 13th and won the Plate section. Mackay and her girls are aiming higher than that.<\/p>\n

Day two of Pool D action will kick off with a tie between Collegiate<\/strong> and St Cyprian’s. Fourth-placed Collegiate will be keen to improve on their one win, one draw, and one loss record from day one, while St Cyprian’s will want to improve their goal difference and add a second win of the festival.<\/p>\n

Pool D Results<\/strong><\/p>\n

Collegiate 0-1 Fatima, Paarl Gim 3-0 St Mary’s Festival XI, St Stithians 1-0 Pearson, St Mary’s, Kloof, 4-0 St Cyprian’s, Collegiate 1-0 St Mary\u2019s Festival XI, Fatima 0-1 Pearson, Paarl Gim 2-0 St Cyprian’s, St Stithians 0-0 St Mary’s, Kloof, Collegiate 0-0 Pearson, St Mary’s Festival XI 0-2 St Cyprian’s, Fatima 0-1 St Mary’s, Kloof, Pearson 2-0 St Mary’s Festival XI, Paarl Gim 1-0 St Stithians.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Paarl Gimnasium was one of the two teams that remained unbeaten in Pool D at the end of the first day of action at the St Mary’s Hockey Festival in Johannesburg on Thursday. The Tanya Pieterse-captained outfit enjoyed a good start to their St Mary’s Festival campaign with a victory against the St Mary\u2019s Festival […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":40256,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40235","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40235\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}