IT HAS been a baptism of fire but the good thing is that 21-year-old St John’s Road Primary and Hudson Park High School product Ignatius Malgraff is soaking it up like a sponge.
This bodes well for the national men’s hockey team in the decade to come.
“Natius,” as the East London-born Malgraff is known, and his SA teammates are taking strain at Hockey World Cup 2014 here in The Hague, Holland.
At time of writing the lads in green and gold had suffered a 4-0 defeat by 2008 and 2012 Olympic champions Germany as well a 5-0 blackwash by New Zealand’s world number six Black Sticks.
The world’s 12th-ranked South Africans, a true-blue amateur side in the presence of a blanket of pro and semi-pro countries with solid national programmes that entail regular camps and umpteen Test matches, only got together as a group of 18 on May 16.
Natius had 19 caps before yesterday’s Group B clash with world number seven South Korea. His SA team, average age 27, only has an average 58 Tests per player while Korea, average age 29, boasts an average 149 Tests per player.
The South Koreans train together and play Test matches for eight months of the year.
As former SA player, head coach and Test cap record holder Gregg Clark once said, it was only after 150 caps that he felt up to speed with the requirements of international hockey.
It is also in the “nothing” Test series in-between the “Majors” (Olympic Games, World Cups, Champions’ Trophy) where teams play for prestige not world ranking points, that you learn from your mistakes so that when the tournaments that really matter come along you are able to handle whatever is put in front of you.
Maybe the SA men’s side’s long-term sponsorship fortunes will turn around so that a proper four-year programme can be put in place, but for the moment Natius is living his childhood dream of mixing it with the very best on the international stage.
“Mentally and physically I am feeling good and ready to run my heart out for my country,” Malgraff said in the team hotel yesterday.
How did it feel when he came through a gruelling process of trials, with over 30 other players, before being named in SA’s World Cup side?
“Super excited. I couldn’t stop smiling,” says Natius with that trademark naughty but nice smile that captivated Argentina’s teenage girls during the February five-Test series in Mar del Plata.
But there is a steel to this young man that explains why he has achieved so much so far.
“It starts with attitude. If you really love playing the sport you will do everything possible to excel and that’s exactly what my coaches saw in me, potential.”
And for this, Natius attributes much to what he learnt as a ‘homeboy’ in East London.
“We produce quality youngsters year in and year out. Our coaches back home encourage players to play club hockey but unfortunately, because it is a small town, I guess, many go elsewhere to study.”
Much of Natius’ early growth he links to Callum Crichton, his Hudson Park first team mentor who recruited this precocious young talent as a Grade 8 to play first team and then Shane Knox, the Border U18 coach.
“East London and its people have given me a lot,” says Natius before he and his national colleagues head into a team discussion.
Hudson Park's Natius not put off by losses
This bodes well for the national men’s hockey team in the decade to come.
“Natius,” as the East London-born Malgraff is known, and his SA teammates are taking strain at Hockey World Cup 2014 here in The Hague, Holland.
At time of writing the lads in green and gold had suffered a 4-0 defeat by 2008 and 2012 Olympic champions Germany as well a 5-0 blackwash by New Zealand’s world number six Black Sticks.
The world’s 12th-ranked South Africans, a true-blue amateur side in the presence of a blanket of pro and semi-pro countries with solid national programmes that entail regular camps and umpteen Test matches, only got together as a group of 18 on May 16.
Natius had 19 caps before yesterday’s Group B clash with world number seven South Korea. His SA team, average age 27, only has an average 58 Tests per player while Korea, average age 29, boasts an average 149 Tests per player.
The South Koreans train together and play Test matches for eight months of the year.
As former SA player, head coach and Test cap record holder Gregg Clark once said, it was only after 150 caps that he felt up to speed with the requirements of international hockey.
It is also in the “nothing” Test series in-between the “Majors” (Olympic Games, World Cups, Champions’ Trophy) where teams play for prestige not world ranking points, that you learn from your mistakes so that when the tournaments that really matter come along you are able to handle whatever is put in front of you.
Maybe the SA men’s side’s long-term sponsorship fortunes will turn around so that a proper four-year programme can be put in place, but for the moment Natius is living his childhood dream of mixing it with the very best on the international stage.
“Mentally and physically I am feeling good and ready to run my heart out for my country,” Malgraff said in the team hotel yesterday.
How did it feel when he came through a gruelling process of trials, with over 30 other players, before being named in SA’s World Cup side?
“Super excited. I couldn’t stop smiling,” says Natius with that trademark naughty but nice smile that captivated Argentina’s teenage girls during the February five-Test series in Mar del Plata.
But there is a steel to this young man that explains why he has achieved so much so far.
“It starts with attitude. If you really love playing the sport you will do everything possible to excel and that’s exactly what my coaches saw in me, potential.”
And for this, Natius attributes much to what he learnt as a ‘homeboy’ in East London.
“We produce quality youngsters year in and year out. Our coaches back home encourage players to play club hockey but unfortunately, because it is a small town, I guess, many go elsewhere to study.”
Much of Natius’ early growth he links to Callum Crichton, his Hudson Park first team mentor who recruited this precocious young talent as a Grade 8 to play first team and then Shane Knox, the Border U18 coach.
“East London and its people have given me a lot,” says Natius before he and his national colleagues head into a team discussion.
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