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27 December 2021 | Story Jóhann Thormählen | Photo Supplied
Annerie
The Kovsie Annerie Dercksen is one of South Africa’s most promising youngsters and climbing the cricketing ladder.

She enjoyed every second of playing with some of her heroes and believes the exposure to international cricket will help her become a better player.

Annerie Dercksen is one of South Africa’s most promising youngsters and climbing the cricketing ladder.

Star from Beaufort West

This second-year Education student from the University of the Free State (UFS), who dreams of playing for the Momentum Proteas, represented the South African Emerging Women’s team three times in 2021.

The star from Beaufort West toured with the side to Bangladesh and also played against Zimbabwe and Thailand in One Day and T20 matches.

According to Dercksen, it is an incredible honour and privilege to be a part of a side.

She soaked up the experience and says everyone was willing to share their knowledge.

“I would have to say, sharing the field with some of my heroes and getting to work with some of the best coaches in the country are some of the highlights.”

She says each tour brought its own challenges and this helped her grow in the way she views and approaches the game.

“In Bangladesh we played against a well-established team in foreign conditions while facing a lot of spinners in spin friendly conditions. Personally, it was quite a challenge and I had to come back and work on some options, especially against spin.”

“Each tour brought its own challenges and this helped me grow in the way I view and approach the game.” - Annerie Dercksen

Coming through the ranks

The all-rounder has come through the ranks. She represented South-Western Districts at school level, played for the South African U19 side and is currently representing the Free State.

But Dercksen didn’t always dream cricket, especially not when playing ‘backyard’ cricket with her brother on the farm.

She didn’t even play for a team at school. “Until a boy from our primary school’s team got sick before a game. A teacher came to class and asked, ‘who can play cricket’, and I put up my hand.”

News Archive

Our Abe Bailey scholars are packing for the UK
2011-08-16

 

Nida Jooste and Ryan Lamb
Photo: Earl Coetzee

Academic excellence and strong leadership has become synonymous with our university, as our two Rhodes scholars for 2011, and the recent announcement of our two Abe Bailey scholars from the UFS have shown.

Nida Jooste and Ryan Lamb are two of the proud recipients of Abe Bailey Travel Bursaries and will be heading off to the United Kingdom on 26 August 2011, to visit several universities in England and Scotland. These two were chosen from hundreds of UFS applicants and will join Abe Bailey bursary holders from the rest of the country.

Both students are academic achievers, but also excel in other fields. This is what set them apart from the rest of the applicants for the bursaries.

Ryan (23), a Medical Physics honours student at our Faculty of Health Sciences, received the Senate Medal for the best bachelor’s degree student at the UFS. He was one of a hundred students at the Brightest Young Minds Summit this year and was one of the 2008 delegates to the World Youth Forum, hosted by the International Association for Poetry and Solidarity in Italy.

This young man is the founder of a group called Poets Anonymous, which provides a platform where poets, artists and dancers in Bloemfontein can express themselves.

Nida (21) is a very familiar face on our Bloemfontein Campus, as she served as the Deputy Chairperson of the Interim Student Council for the past year.

This fourth-year LL.B. student says she has known about the Abe Bailey bursary since her first year, but had to wait to apply, since the scholarship is only open to final-year students and junior lecturers. She applied last year, but did not even make it to the short list for candidates.

“I realise now that I was not involved enough then. Luckily I became much more involved in campus activities during the past year and also improved my academic performance greatly,” she says.

Nida and Ryan both hope to use the opportunity to learn new approaches to solving problems. Ryan says he is looking forward to the opportunity to network with other bursary holders and to share experiences with them, before returning to the UFS to implement what he had learned.

Nida says she also hopes to see how universities in First-World Countries operate, in order to apply that knowledge when she returns to the UFS.

 

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