Updated: Rain Forces U18 Festival Delay

Due to the waterlogged Hartleyvale pitch following heavy morning rain, Friday afternoon’s much-anticipated semi-finals at the Cape Town International Schools/Clubs Under-18 Hockey Festival have been postponed until Sunday morning.

After much deliberation, festival director Chris Brothers and tournament director Feico Mulder came to the decision due to the extremely slippery pitch, which made for unsafe playing conditions.

“It is very unfortunate, and we apologise to the many fans who had indicated they would be attending, but safety was a major concern and the overriding reason for Feico and I having to make this call,” said Brothers, the brain behind this hugely successful 32-team event that is now into its ninth year.

The silver lining to the cloud surrounding Hartleyvale Friday was that fans can look forward to six cracking matches Sunday, as well as hotly contested Shield, Bowl and Plate finals, making for a great day’s hockey at Cape Town’s premier hockey venue.

Sunday’s semi-finals will see the girls taking the field at 8.30 am with Paarl Gim against Somerset College on the Hartleyvale stadium pitch, while Bloemhof and DF Malan will battle it at the same time on the B field pitch in a bid to qualify for Sunday’s 2.30 pm final.

There was some cross-pool hockey at Hartleyvale earlier Friday, with Edgemead High School’s girls’ first team shrugging off a lean spell and delighting their loyal supporters with back-to-back wins over luckless Bergvliet.

The Chisipite girls from Zimbabwe will relish their win against the Stellenbosch institution, Rhenish, while the girls from Pinelands were undone 2-0 by York High, and Stellenberg put four past the New South Wales Bushrangers. Pretoria Girls’ High – coached by former SA goalkeeper David Reid-Ross, the father of current national drag-flick king Justin Reid-Ross – enjoyed a 3-0 win against Outeniqua.