THE German women’s soccer team, Osnabrucker Sport Club, drew first blood on their visit to the Eastern Cape on Monday, when they hammered a Cluster 1 team 12–0 at Queens College’s Recreation Grounds in Komani.
Mara Riekmann and Laura Intelmann both scored hat tricks while Sofia Buchmiller and Nele Birth scored a brace each. The captain, Lilly Abelmann, and Lena Bockrath rounded off the scoring for the visitors.
The home side lost one of their experienced players, Oyisa Marhasi, to a dislocated shoulder injury in the first half as the rain was falling in Komani.
Osnabrucker is a women’s soccer team from the State of Lower Saxony in Germany and they will play three matches against u/17 women’s soccer teams during the tour against teams selected from three clusters.
Cluster 1 comprises Chris Hani District, Alfred Nzo and Joe Gqabi.
Cluster 2 consists of Buffalo City, O.R Tambo and Amathole, who played in East London yesterday. The result was not available at the time of going to print. Meanwhile cluster 3 of Nelson Mandela Bay and Sarah Baartman will play the visitors tomorrow in Port Elizabeth.
The visit is part of an exchange programme and twinning cooperation between Eastern Cape Government and German Federation State.
Osnabrucker head coach, Artur Cumacenko, said his team was very excited to play in South Africa.
“At first we were a bit nervous but excited at the same time. We had problems getting into the game. We needed some time to focus and play our normal game. Our girls played well today and are looking forward to the rest of the tour,” said Cumacenko.
Aphelele Nonkotha, who was coaching the home side, said she needed more time preparing the squad, since her players came from three different regions.
