African teams are tough, warn SA hockey teams before Games qualifier

Between them, the national men’s and women’s hockey teams have lost only once at an African Olympic qualifying tournament in the past 20 years, but both sides say they’re taking nothing for granted at the 2023 edition in Pretoria from Sunday.

Places at the 2024 Paris Games are available only for the winners, to be decided in the finals next Sunday. 

The women have never lost, while the men were beaten by Egypt at the 2003 tournament, which also happened to be the last time qualification was staged under the All Africa Games banner.

“I’ve never experienced easy matches in this tournament,” men’s coach Cheslyn Gie said at a press conference in Pretoria on Thursday.

“Something that worries us is we haven’t played a Test match since the World Cup [in late January], so it’s going to be tough to adjust to the speed and pace of the game.”

Captain Dayaan Cassiem echoed his view. “I think in Africa every game is tough. We have to take it game by game and from there see what happens.”

But he was heartened by the preparations in camp.

“It’s going really well, the boys are working hard. Yesterday [Wednesday] some of the guys ran 8km in a squad game.

“It’s nice that the team hasn’t changed a lot from previous tournaments so the culture is the same. We’re ready to compete and make the country proud.”

But they will be without a few familiar faces when the final 18-man squad is announced on Friday, partly because of injuries and partly because a few players were unable to get leave from work.

“It’s not a full squad, we’ve had some injuries,” said Gie. “But it’s a very good squad.”

Celia Seerane, one of the senior players in the women’s squad, was upbeat about her team’s chances. 

“We’ve had great prep, probably the best prep I’ve ever had leading up to an African Cup,” she said.

“We’ve had a technical camp and another camp that was game focused. So we feel the team and the mood in the camp is exciting. We’re focused, we’re not taking anything for granted.”

Seerane was excited about the new talent coming through.

“I have a 17-year-old teammate, Paris-Gail Isaacs. That is incredible and she’s done well. I’ve watched her play for a year or two.

“The youngsters, I found they bring a new spirit to our camp. They don’t have fear, they just want to play,” she added, pointing out the older players tended to be more cautious.

“[Getting] that balance, it’s tricky. I think this team now, we have found the balance.”

Assistant women’s coach Inky Zondi stressed the significance of the tournament. “For us it's the one ticket we have to the Games so we’re taking this seriously.

“We believe everyone’s here to get that ticket as well. We don’t believe anyone’s here to make up the numbers.”

For the women’s Olympic aspirations, it’s Pretoria or bust.

The men, however, will have another shot at qualifying if they don’t make it in Pretoria, but it will be a far harder ask.

The reason is the men are ranked 14th in the world, but the women are just outside the top 20, making them ineligible for the global qualification tournament.

There has been concern about whether the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (Sascoc) will pick the hockey sides if they qualify — both were left home for the 2016 Rio Games.

Sport minister Zizi Kodwa recently requested that Sascoc revisit its selection policy because he wanted a lean, medal-heavy team.

But the word coming out of Sascoc is they will stick to the same selection criteria used for the Tokyo Olympics, where the men’s and women’s hockey sides competed.

The players’ biggest obstacles are what happens between now and next weekend.

Eight teams are competing in the men’s tournament, where Egypt is South Africa's main rival, and seven in the women’s.

The tournament will feature two pools with teams progressing into knockout stages.

SA group match schedules:

Men: SA vs Zimbabwe (6pm Sunday); SA vs Nigeria (6pm Monday); SA vs Uganda (8pm Wednesday).

Women: SA vs Zimbabwe (4pm Sunday); SA vs Nigeria (8pm Monday).