Bronze for SA underwater hockey ladies
Two SA women's teams have won bronze at the Underwater Hockey World Championship in Australia.
The South African Underwater Hockey Ladies' Teams converted the bitter disappointment of losing in the semi-finals, into pride when both the U19 and U/23 Ladies won bronze on Saturday.
Both teams worked hard for a shot at gold but the U/19 ladies where denied a spot in the finals by hosts Australia who beat them in a hard semi-final on Friday morning.
The 2015 world champions say they were very disappointed not to have a chance to defend their title in the finals.
They went on to beat Columbia 3-0 in the bronze medal game to secure a place on the podium.
The SA U/23 ladies lost the semi-final against the 2015 world champs Columbia on Friday morning after beating Columbia 1-0, through a goal in the last 20 seconds, in the round robin stages.
The game was a well-balanced match, but in the end the South Africans lost 2-1.
The team then went on to beat Great Britain 1-0 in a very hard bronze medal game on Saturday morning.
This was the first U/23 medal ever (ladies or men) for South Africa and with many of the current team still eligible and many of the 2015 U/19 world champions going up to U/23 for 2019, SA is set to have a very good U/23 ladies team in Sheffield, Great Britain in 2019.
The U/19 and U/23 men both played excellent playoff matches against France on Thursday but narrowly missed out.
The U/23 men lost their place in the semis losing only 1-0 in a match that could have gone either way.