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18 July 2019 | Story Ruan Bruwer
Gauta Mokati
The men’s football team from the University of the Free State will be captained by Gauta Mokati. He led the South African Student team at last year’s CUCSA (Confederation of University and College Sports Association) Games.

The coach of the men’s football team is hoping that their ability to adapt to a new game plan, if required, will stand them in good stead during the upcoming Varsity Football tournament.

The Kovsies are back in Varsity Football after five years, thanks to their performance at last year’s USSA championship where they finished sixth.

They will feature in the opening match on 25 July 2019, a fixture played at Shimla Park that will be broadcast live on SuperSport.

“In the Free State Motsepe Cup, we were one of the youngest teams. Now we intend to use the experience we have gained to benefit us in the Varsity Football competition. We can play a physical game and a technical game, as well as a combination of both,” said coach Godfrey Tenoff.

“We had a lot of high-pressure matches in the past two years to prepare us. Although the team is young, they have actually been exposed through various competitions.”

The UFS team received a favourable draw, playing four of their seven matches at home. Two of those opponents, the Tshwane University of Technology (22 August) and the University of Johannesburg (29 August), made last year’s semi-final. The UFS have a score to settle with UJ, who knocked them out in the semi-final in 2014.

“We need to give the crowd something to believe in. Once the crowd see the intent and passion, they can rally behind us. The most important thing is to play with confidence for each other, for the team, and for the badge. The crowd will appreciate that.”

News Archive

It is not every day you get to build a heart
2014-09-17

According to the World Health Organisation, heart disease is the leading cause of death world wide. Heart transplantations substantially outperform any other available treatment and extend life by an average of 15 years, but the shortage of donor organs and organ rejection still remain a challenge.

Getting closer to the day where it will be possible to produce human organs by using human cells, researchers at the University of the Free State (UFS) announced that they have successfully decellularized a primate heart.

Decellularization is the process of taking an organ and stripping its cells, leaving behind a framework of binding tissue. The organ can then be repopulated (recellularized) with the patient's own cells - a process considered to move heart research closer to the day when a patient can become his own donor.

This process was discovered in 2008 by American cardiologist, Dr Doris Taylor of the University of Minnesota, who decellularized and recellularized a beating rat heart in a laboratory.

World wide researchers already used the process of decellularization on rat and pig hearts, but the research team of the UFS is the first to use this on a primate heart.

Complete media release.

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