GRA Ladies plan long reign as African champs but Telkom Kenya promise comeback
George Ernest Asare Sports News
GRA Ladies captain, Monica Sewell-Gran, still basking in the glory of leading her team to win the just-ended Hockey Africa Cup for Clubs Championship in Accra, says the team are poised for a long reign as African hockey queens.
GRA Ladies defeated defending champions Telkom Orange 1-0 in a hard-fought final at the Theodosia Okoh Hockey Stadium last Saturday.
In a post-match interview, Monica said they had been motivated by their continental triumph and were determined to build on the success story.
“We are adequately motivated to keep the trophy for a long time. We are not going to sleep, but going to work very hard to be in the position to defend it on many occasions.
In a post-match interview, Monica said they had been motivated by their continental triumph and were determined to build on the success story.
“We are adequately motivated to keep the trophy for a long time. We are not going to sleep, but going to work very hard to be in the position to defend it on many occasions.
“Telkom Orange have been a real tormentor for a long time, so we planned for this, and surely, we have beaten them to the title at long last.
That explains why we are going to train well for us to defend the trophy on many occasions,” Monica told the Graphic Sports.
Meanwhile, after failing to defend the continental title, dethroned African champions Telkom Orange have accepted the challenge to return stronger in a bid to reclaim the crown they lost to GRA Ladies last Saturday.
Telkom captain, Tracy Karanja Nungari, promised to marshall her teammates to stage a strong comeback and snatch the title from the Ghanaians at the next continental tournament.
A confident Tracy told the Graphic Sports in a post-match interview that GRA Ladies were only living on borrowed glory and that Telkom would ensure the trophy returned to Kenya at the end of the next tourney.
“We have only lent the trophy to the Ghanaians to compensate for their hunger for such a trophy after 30 years of searching. I really applaud GRA Ladies for snatching the trophy from us. We did our best to defend it but we failed to utilise a number of goal scoring opportunities that came our way.
“We are returning home to plot a different strategy, and we will return with much more venom to confront our rivals to take away what belong to us,“ the Telkom captain promised.
“We are coming back for the title . This is because we are hungry for it. We are going to readjust our strategies to be able to take the title once again. This is because we are ever hungry for such trophies.”