Taekwondo club shines again

MASERU – Three months ago, New Millennium Taekwondo club clinched first place at the Swazi Championship and they have done it again with another winning performance outside the country.

Last weekend a team of 38 athletes were crowned the overall champions of the University of Botswana Open Taekwondo Championship held in Botswana.

In total, New Millennium club brought home a total of 36 medals. Only two of their 38 athletes failed to win a medal, and that is because they were beaten by their own teammates. 

The players and their two coaches, Ramosoeu Nkuebe and Mahloanane Mahloane, left the country last Thursday evening and arrived in Gaborone on Friday morning where they did their pre-championship duties like weighing in ahead of competing.

The competition was attended by eight teams coming from Botswana and Eswatini and it was New Millennium who ruled the show bringing home 20 gold medals, 10 silver and six bronze medals and the winner’s trophy.

New Millennium took 27 boys and 11 girls to the tournament. Of the 20 gold medals they won, seven were won by girls.

Mahloane said the coaches specialise on certain techniques and make sure the players master them so that when they get to competition, they know what works for them.

“We don’t have a secret but we give ourselves time to train them and give them programs that suit them in training, we don’t just train them,” Mahloane said.

“Everyone has their own thing they specialise on and you focus on so that when you get to competition you don’t struggle, you don’t think too much, you know what you have trained and you have to use that skill.”

New Millennium successes in the regional competitions may suggest they are a level above their opponents and their trainers say they dream of taking the athletes abroad to compete.

“I think they are fine; we wish for them to go overseas and compete but the funds are the main problem,” Nkuebe said.

New Millennium’s team in Eswatini was a mixture of athletes from ‘Mabathoana, Makoanyane and Lithabaneng high schools and Mahloane said compared to three months ago in Botswana, their performance was even more impressive.

He said although these competitions may seem to be below them now because of their success, they do not let the athletes feel they are better than what they actually are.

“We don’t give them that chance to feel like they are now the best, we keep telling them all the time that you have to keep learning no matter how much you think you know, you have to improve,” Mahloane said.

“You can never call yourself the best, it’s like school, you learn a new thing every day,” Nkuebe chipped in.

The team’s youngest athlete competed in the 6-8 age category.

New Millennium will not be going to competitions between now and December because the athletes will be focusing on their school exams. However, they have a training camp in Eswatini in December they will be attending.

Seven of their athletes have been selected for the national team going to the African Union Sports Council (AUSC) Region 5 Games in Malawi in December.

Although the final squad is yet to be determined, they have been training.

Tlalane Phahla