SA championships

The South African Championships were held on 28/29 November 2009. They were the third annual SA Table Football Championships held at Panorama Sports Club. A record field of 35 players flicked off and competed in the following categories: Under 11, Under 13 and Seniors. The Under 11’s flicked off on Saturday and 20 youngsters competed in five groups of four players. This competition was held on brand new smaller designed ‘FLICK-OFF’ pitches (six-a-side). The smaller fields have proved to be a tremendous success with the juniors with a lot more flicking and interaction between the players taking place. Each player received a commemorative soccer ball.
The Janus Gersie-Fair play award was handed to Daygin Prescott for exceptional sportsmanship towards his fellow players and match officials.
The final was contested between good friends, Slade Livesey and Anthony Davis. This is the third consecutive Junior Final between the two friends.
In an extremely tight game Slade lived up to his status as the number one Under 11 player in South Africa and defeated Anthony by one goal to nil.
Both Slade and Anthony are only 8 years old and the potential showed by these players are really great. The senior players will concentrate on all the juniors next season with special emphasis on the latter as SATFA believe these two juniors are future world champions.
On Sunday the Under 13’s and Senior Championships were contested with 15 players taking part. Richard Graaff had a clean sweep of victories in this category and was duly crowned Under 13 SA Champion. The Senior category had two groups of 5 players (including juniors Richard Graaff and Brandon Pienaar). In the semi-finals, Harold Silber’s hot winning streak of four victories in a row came to an end against the fast improving Fernando Rodrigues who won in a penalty shoot-out after the game ended goalless. The second semi-final also proved to be a very tight game with Clifford Graaff edging out Jason Kennedy by the odd goal. The final pitted African Open Champion, Clifford Graaff against the most improved player of 2009, Fernando Rodrigues. In an action-packed final Clifford Graaff won his second SA title by defeating Fernando by two goals to nil.
In summary SATFA is extremely pleased with the progress made in 2009. Our registered players, who have taken part in any SATFA organized tournament/league is now in excess of 50. Bigger and exciting plans are envisaged for 2010, which will prove to be a watershed year for our local soccer and our ever increasing table football community.