Kutlwano bag one, lose one

Frederick Kebadiretse
Staff Writer
@Lobatse Stadium | Monday November 15, 2010 00:00

 

The women's team had a scare earlier during the day when they had to recover from 2-0 down in the first two sets to register a hard fought 3-2 win over Mafolofolo in a game that stretched over two hours. Kutlwano, who are the Mascom Volleyball League champions in both men and women categories, progressed smoothly to the finals after  their men won 3-0 against BDF VI while women beat Kalavango 3-1. On the women's side, Mafolofolo women beat BDF 3-0 to proceed to the finals while Police beat Diphatsa 3-1 on their way to the finals. It was therefore no surprise when a tough battle was anticipated in the women's finals   considering the two sides' rich rivalry. Kutlwano knew it was never going to be a walk in the park as they found themselves on the losing end at the end of the first two sets. It took some extraordinary motivation from the technical team led by coach Isaac Samuel and a notable outstanding performance from Lekedzani Bayi for the champions to have a terrific come back into the game and emerge victorious. Mafolofolo won the first set 25-22 with Nono Reetsang as the major destroyer for the champions as they often failed to block her thunderous strikes in the opening two sets.

Mafolofolo were even more dominant in the second set that they won 25-23.

However, things took a sharp twist in the third set when Mafolofolo looked to be sailing for a victory. Kutlwano made a wonderful recovery as Mafolofolo players were starting to show some fatigue, a thing that motivated them to win the set 25-19. The fourth set was closely contested with either side leading by a single point throughout the set until Kutlwano won 25-22 to make it 2-2 and force the game into the decisive fifth set.

Mafolofolo were already devastated in the decisive set committing schoolgirl errors and Kutlwano did not struggle to win the set 15-8 and clinch the championship trophy and the P10, 000 prize money. Third-placed in the men's category was Diphatsa who beat BDF 3-0 on the losers' finals earlier while in the women's category Kalavango came third after beating BDF by the same margin.