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The triumphant Windhoek Gymnasium Lions. Photo Marly Schrader
The triumphant Windhoek Gymnasium Lions. Photo Marly Schrader

Gymnasium Lions beat WHS in second half

School sports
Andrew Poolman
Judging their first appearance in a full-scale match, the Windhoek Gymnasium Lions looked impressive in their 35-16 home win against Samsung Windhoek High School, as the highlight of their schools’ week-long, multi-sport interhigh.

Head coach Mauritz Thirion, assisted by Jaco Engels, Janneman Brand and Frikkie Maartens, will take the Gymnasium first rugby team on a tour to Japan this week where they will contest the Sanix World Rugby Youth tournament.

As the only Namibian representatives in a tournament featuring schools from Australia, New Zealand, England, Fiji, USA, Korea and Japan, the Gymnasium boys will be pooled against Truro College (England) and Japanese challengers Osaka Toin High School and Oita Tomei High School. Matches will be contested in halves of 25 minutes each.

On Saturday night, the Gymnasium Lions repeated their interhigh win at Vegkop last year (15-6) when they ran out convincing winners – taking over after an 8-8 stalemate at halftime.

Kicking points on both sides went astray in the first half, with Gymnasium flyhalf Waldre Kotze striking first with a penalty before his WHS counterpart William Beukes equalised.

Gymnasium flank Zack von Wielligh crashed over to round off pressure on the WHS goalline, before slick handling in the Kudu Bulls backline sent left wing Sergio Steenkamp on an exciting run beating three defenders to the corner.

Gymnasiuim’s made their superior forward power count when prop Daniel du Toit crashed out from close range for a try which Kotze converted (15-8).

WHS hit back determinedly with a try by lock Keanan Louw, while replacement Joshua Moller took over the kicking to add a penalty. Waldre Kotze was accurate with another penalty that restored the home team’s lead (18-16), before Gymnasium pulled away with Zack von Wielligh second try (a more lang-range effort after a WHS handling mistake) and the final move which full-back Jandre van Zyl converted under the posts from an off-load by captain and Nr 8 Ruan Agenbag. Kotze’s kicking delivered 15 points on the night.

• Full interhigh results on page 2.

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Namibian Sun 2024-11-24

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