{"id":41341,"date":"2024-04-14T12:38:03","date_gmt":"2024-04-14T10:38:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ssschoolsplus.co.za\/?p=41341"},"modified":"2024-04-14T12:38:03","modified_gmt":"2024-04-14T10:38:03","slug":"bishops-breeze-past-df-malan-to-kick-off-league-season-in-style","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/?p=41341","title":{"rendered":"Bishops breeze past DF Malan to kick off league season in style"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_41347\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-41347\" style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-41347\" src=\"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/53605276046_51ea4dffc9_o-1-400x267.jpg\" alt=\"The Bishops first hockey side in a team huddle during their 175 Hockey Festival in Cape Town in March. Photo: Karli Coetzee\" width=\"400\" height=\"267\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-41347\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Bishops first hockey side in a team huddle during their 175 Hockey Festival in Cape Town in March. Photo: Karli Coetzee<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>After an impressive run during the pre-season, <strong>Bishops Diocesan College<\/strong> kept the pedal to the metal and began their Western Cape league season in style, hammering <strong>DF Malan<\/strong> 8-0 at the Woodlands Astroturf in Cape Town on Friday night.<\/p>\n<p>Before the match, Bishops had only played nine competitive matches &#8211; three at the <strong>Parel Vallei Hockey Festival<\/strong> in March, and six at the <a href=\"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/bishops-175-hosts-tick-all-the-boxes-at-their-home-festival\/\"><strong>Bishops 175 Hockey Festival<\/strong> <\/a>last month.<\/p>\n<p>In their home event, coach <strong>Ryan Julius&#8217;<\/strong>s boys were a cut above the rest, beating every opponent they faced, much to the delight of the home supporters.<\/p>\n<p>They scored wins over<strong> Michaelhouse<\/strong> (3-1), <strong>St Charles College<\/strong> (4-0), <strong>St David&#8217;s Marist Inanda<\/strong> (2-0), <strong>St Andrew&#8217;s School<\/strong> (8-0), <strong>St Benedict&#8217;s College<\/strong> (4-0), and Makhanda&#8217;s <strong>St Andrew&#8217;s College<\/strong> (2-1).<\/p>\n<p>Bishops then went on a much-deserved break, before facing DF Malan on Friday night.<\/p>\n<p>DF entered the clash on the back of a 0-2 defeat to a good <strong>Worcester Gimnasium<\/strong> team a week ago, and Bishops was in no mood to make matters any easier for them.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Joshua Mettler<\/strong>, who was in superb form at the 175 Festival, continued his fine goal-scoring run in front of a buzzing crowd at Woodlands.<\/p>\n<p>At the 175 Festival, it was Mettler who scored the winning goal for his team against previously undefeated St Andrew&#8217;s College when the match looked like it was heading for a 1-1 draw.<\/p>\n<p>On Friday, he picked up from where he left off, netting a whopping four times against DF Malan.<\/p>\n<p>There was also a double from <strong>Andrew Raubenheimer<\/strong>, and <strong>Adam Diggle<\/strong> and <strong>Albert Steyn<\/strong> also struck, to make it eight.<\/p>\n<p>Reflecting on the contest, coach Julius said he was pleased with how his team had executed the game plan, particularly after being away from the game for over two weeks.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It was an excellent team display,&#8221; he told <strong>SuperSport Schools<\/strong> after the match.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a good thing that we&#8217;ve started the league like this.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I\u2019m proud of the boys. They adapted well to the tactics that we trained this week. They executed the game plan well, and we were dominant on attack and defence,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_41348\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-41348\" style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-41348\" src=\"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/53605488333_c83ea7f109_o-400x267.jpg\" alt=\"Bishops shot-stopper, Mu'aath Ganief has been immense for the Cape side at the back. He has only conceded two goals in the past seven matches. Photo: Karli Coetzee \" width=\"400\" height=\"267\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-41348\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Goalkeeper Mu&#8217;aath Ganief has been immense for Bishops at the back and has conceded only two goals in their past seven matches. Photo: Karli Coetzee<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Bishops next shift their focus to a meeting with <strong>Curro Durbanville<\/strong>, who played to a 2-2 draw with <strong>Langa Hockey Club<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Their game against Curro will be followed with an outing against <strong>Stellenberg High<\/strong> <strong>School<\/strong> before they take on <strong>SACS<\/strong> on the first weekend of May in what is likely to be their biggest challenge of the season.<\/p>\n<p>Julius, though, has urged his side to remain focussed and take it one match at a time.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s really important now that we stay nice and grounded,&#8221; he stressed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We understand that we&#8217;ve done well, but the journey has just started, and we need to get back to the drawing board and continue riding this wave for as long as we can.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We need to stay nice and focused, humble in victory, and understand that through hard work and preparation, we&#8217;ll succeed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve told the boys to just stay focused on the task that&#8217;s ahead of us. But I am proud of how they played and, I must say, the identity and culture we are creating at the school is positive,&#8221; he concluded.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After an impressive run during the pre-season, Bishops Diocesan College kept the pedal to the metal and began their Western Cape league season in style, hammering DF Malan 8-0 at the Woodlands Astroturf in Cape Town on Friday night. Before the match, Bishops had only played nine competitive matches &#8211; three at the Parel Vallei [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":41347,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41341","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\/41341","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\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41341\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}