Varsity Cup 2018: Maties don’t play around

attacks by the hosts and the entire team must be commended for the bravery they showed with their tryline under siege.

Tuks were eventually rewarded for their relentless toil when Xolisa Guma calmly gathered a cross kick from flyhalf Tinus de Beer to see the home team register the first points of the season.

However, Tuks played into the opposition’s hands by forcing play in their own half and from the plethora of handling errors aided by a Highveld thunderstorm that brought a deluge of rain, Shimlas struck back with a try from wing Francois Agenbag from deep in their half.

After the halftime interval, Shimlas continued to apply the pressure through their forwards winning the war of attrition and the hard working flank Benjamin Janse van Vuuren extended the visitors lead with a try in the 45th minute.

Dobela was on hand to give the visitors a handy 14-point cushion with a well-struck penalty in the 52nd minute.

Tuks tried to stage a valiant comeback when centre Toko Seerane crashed over, but they left it too late with captain Denzel Hill scoring a consolation try after the fulltime hooter had sounded.

Last year’s losing finalists Stellenbosch University got their campaign off to a perfect start with a 31-3 win over the University of Johannesburg at UJ Stadium.

Maties made their intentions known from the onset when Michal Haznar scored in the third minute, before wing Duncan Saal rounded off a grubber kick to canter over.

The visitors’ first-half dominance was completed by hooker Wilmar Arnoldi, who crashed over from a disjointed rolling maul.

UJ did their best to be competitive in the second half, but had to work with scraps of possession while Maties seemingly took their foot off the pedal and only managed to add one more try by lock Johan Momsen to complete a convincing win.

The University of the North West also made an impeccable start to the competition with a 70-7 annihilation of the Central University of Technology in Potchefstroom last night.

Pukke led 24-7 at the halftime break, having scored three tries while CUT had done well to register their seven pointer through Tiaan Erasmus.

Wits University stole victory from the jaws of defeat when AJ van Blerk scored a try in the 74th minute to hand his team the lead and ultimately a 30-26 win against Ikeys in Cape Town.