KNYSNA NEWS - Sam Mvimbi and his South African teammates are currently enjoying the preliminaries for the 2024 Paris Olympics in Cape Town, where they're playing matches against Netherlands, India and France in the Summer Preparation Series.
The matches are a mix of friendlies and official test matches, offering the SA men the perfect opportunity to match themselves up against some of the nations they will face at the Olympics in July and August.
As part of the series they are playing two friendly matches against France, one test against Netherlands and one test against India.
They played the first of the two friendlies against France on Saturday 20 January, a match that turned out to be a thriller as South Africa managed to emerge 3-2 victors.
A couple of days later they come up against the European champions and world number one, Netherlands, with Sam Mvimbi lining up at centre back for the encounter.
An early goal for Netherlands put them 1-0 up in the first minute, but SA soon found their feet and settled into the game. Netherlands scored a second at the end of the first quarter, but their goals dried up for a long while after that.
SA failed to capitalise on three penalty corners, and Netherlands scored their third and final goal in the final moments of the game to secure a 3-0 win for the Dutch.
The SA men lined up against India next for their test match on Friday 26 January, which they lost 3-0, followed by the final match of the Summer Preparation Series against France on Sunday 28 January which they managed to win.
This series will prove to have been a vital part of their Paris preparations.
Because they were drawn in a pool alongside two of the opponents from their Summer Preparation Series, France and Netherlands, this series is crucial for their Olympic readiness.
The draw, which took place on Tuesday 23 January, also put Germany, Spain and Great Britain in Pool A, a tough draw for the South Africans.
Pool B sees Asian qualifiers India joined by Pan America champions Argentina and Oceania champions Australia.
The group is concluded by Great Britain and New Zealand who qualified in Oman as well as Ireland and secured the final qualification place in Spain.
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