FNB Ikey Tigers cling to their lead
The FNB Ikey Tigers picked up another win on Saturday as they saw off a late push by Belhar to win the match 27-23 and lift themselves up to sixth place on the log. While another victory under their belts will help the team, they know they will need to be at their best this upcoming weekend when they take on league leaders Hamiltons.
“We’re stoked about the win, I’m glad the boys were able to hang on to their lead until the end,” explained coach Esterhuizen.
The difference between the two teams at the fulltime whistle was four points, and after handling their opponents for most of the game, the FNB Ikey Tigers saw themselves having to prevent a comeback from Belhar. “The game was going well, but they managed to score two tries fifteen minutes before the match ended. But we stuck to our guns and defended well, and we came out with a good away win,” said Esterhuizen
“We started the match quite well, and at no point in the match were we behind. We were always leading. We always start well, but we’ve seen a bit of a pattern in some games where we lose concentration in the second half. In this game, we knew we were up against tough opponents so we were more mentally prepared for it,” he added.
On the day, all the teams representing the University of Cape Town won their matches by comfortable margins. The 2nd team won 29-10, the 3rd team won 17-0 and the Young Guns won their match 29-14. All of the Ikeys teams enjoyed the luxury of not having another Wednesday night fixture, but it is far from over as the team still has to play five games in only twenty-five days.
The FNB Ikey Tigers side that was fielded against Belhar:
1 William Day, 2 Brenton Greaves, 3 Warying Losper, 4 Duncan Saffy, 5 David Meihuizen, 6 Liam Greenalgh, 7 Sanele Malwane, 8 Brad Bosman, 9 Stef de Gouveia (C), 10 Lohan Lubbe, 11 Joel Smith, 12 Rico Lategan, 13 Robbie Ball, 14 Damian Rawstone, 15 Matthew Redman
Replacements:
16 Msizi Zondi, 17 Martin Chandler, 18 Alva Sendreyani, 19 Busanda, 20 Stef de Gouveia, 21 Dylan Tydbury, 22 Liam Furniss, 23 Ibie Adams.
