South Africans Palesa Sekhonyana & Natasha Webber Earn Silver at Zone VI Beach Tour

South Africans Palesa Sekhonyana and Natasha Webber faced a challenging task of battling favourites, Sinaportar and Muniango from Mozambique in the women’s final of the 7th leg of the Zone VI Beach Tour.

The visitors won 21-9, preventing the hosts from reaching the podium as the gold medallists.

Sinaportar and Muniango came into the clash as favourites but despite that tag, they refused to take their opponents for granted. According to Sinaportar, her Brazilian coach watched the South Africans’ semi-final encounter against the 3rd ranked team from Mozambique and crafted a solid game plan for victory.

Relying on their vast experience the Mozambican team took a 8-4 lead that immediately put undue pressure on their challengers. What was very evident from the outset was that the team from Mozambique had developed an excellent synergy after having played together for many years.

Taking the scorching weather conditions into account, Sinaportar & Muniango sacrificed power for ‘soft touches’ into open spaces that made the SA pair work harder to recover balls that floated into the far reaches of the back court.

While Palesa and Natasha are no strangers to this level of competition, they lacked game time together as a team to pose a real threat to the number one seeds. With her experience, Palesa knew that when things became decidedly uncomfortable, she sacrificed power for controlled soft attacks into open spaces to pick up valuable points. With Palesa’s deft touches out of the reach of her opponents and Natasha’s occasional power attacks the South Africans bounced back into contention. However, not to be out done Sinaportar and Muniango’s reliance on a variety of attacking options gave them the edge.

While the sizzling heat and the burning sand added to the woes of the South African pairing, Webber had to contend with an injured foot which she sustained during the semi-final match a day earlier. Normally an energetic athlete on court, her mobility was hampered by her injury.

Photo 1 Caption: South Africans Palesa Sekhonyana & Natasha Webber faced a challenging task of battling favourites, Sinaportar & Muniango from Mozambique in the women’s final of the 7th leg of the Zone VI Beach Tour. Photo: Volleyball SA (Facebook)