FNB Madibaz rugby player Johan Lombard says the team will be aiming to deliver a full 80-minute performance when they clash with Cape Peninsula University of Technology in Cape Town tomorrow.<\/p>\n
The 20-year-old inside centre was the Player that Rocks against Rhodes last week and is confident ahead of their next Varsity Shield fixture.<\/p>\n
There is a bit of history between the two teams because the Nelson Mandela University outfit defeated CPUT in the round-robin phase last season, but lost out to them in the tournament final.<\/p>\n
Madibaz have lost one game so far this year, to Walter Sisulu University, but Lombard said there was still a strong spirit within the squad.<\/p>\n
“I believe we have the ability to pull this game [against CPUT] through,” he said.<\/p>\n
“We just have to make sure we keep our focus for the full 80 minutes and not allow them time to get into the game.”<\/p>\n
The third-year agricultural management student is playing in his first Varsity Shield competition and said he was delighted to be recognised for his efforts against Rhodes.<\/p>\n
In that match he crossed for two tries and kicked three conversions for a personal tally of 16 points in the 50-0 result.<\/p>\n
“Yes, that was very nice,” he said. “I think it was a good overall team performance that led to the final result.<\/p>\n
“We played a selfless game and made sure that we tried to get the ball wide.<\/p>\n
“It was a matter of sticking to our structures and I just focused on what was expected from me in an individual capacity.”<\/p>\n
The 2020 tournament is shaping up as a critical one for Madibaz rugby as they seek to return to the top-flight Varsity Cup competition next year.<\/p>\n
The team with the most log points over the 2019 and 2020 tournaments will earn promotion.<\/p>\n
Madibaz’ unbeaten run last year saw them finish on 30 points, five ahead of CPUT.<\/p>\n
Although they suffered a slight setback with the loss to Walter Sisulu, the Nelson Mandela University outfit still head the combined log.<\/p>\n
The latest overall standings are (2019 and 2020): Madibaz 41 (9), CPUT 34 (9), WSU 30 (9), UKZN 17 (8), Fort Hare 14 (8), TUT 9 (8), Rhodes 5 (9).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
FNB Madibaz rugby player Johan Lombard says the team will be aiming to deliver a full 80-minute performance when they clash with Cape Peninsula University of Technology in Cape Town tomorrow. The 20-year-old inside centre was the Player that Rocks against Rhodes last week and is confident ahead of their next Varsity Shield fixture. There […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":58746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1771,2800,3837],"class_list":["post-36511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-madibaz","tag-nelson-mandela-university","tag-varsity-shield"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36511\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}