The tallest goal shooter in the province, Rahab Ngobeni has retired from provincial team, the Baobabs.
Scripted endings to careers are rare in sports, but the tallest netball star, Rahab Ngobeni wrote her career with a remarkable flourish as a goal shooter for the provincial side, the Baobabs.
Too often great players hobble into retirement on the arm of a physiotherapist, or choose euthanasia, a quick pre-emptive press conference to avoid the indignity of being dropped.
Those, like Ngobeni, who make it to the field that one last time are overpowered by the occasion, the first time in their lives when there will not be another chance, and invariably disappoint.
Their standing ovation is a retrospective one, substituting that day’s fumbling with a decade of remembered splendour.
But Ngobeni, who has already announced quietly that has retired from active participation from the ailing Baobabs, has always written her own script.
Granted, her plots have been somewhat repetitive and decidedly too mucho to garner the acclaim of aesthetes.
Act 1: Ngobeni scores an avalanche of goals, Act 2: Ngobeni intercepted aerial distributions through the pain barrier and put the ball into the mounted ring, Act 3: Ngobeni watched with deep frustration as the Baobabs games continued to tumble.
But she has acted with unmatched intensity, skill and attention to detail.
In some quarters, Ngobeni, who retired at the age of 30, is as immovable and immortal as the traditions of domestic netball.
It was during a tension-filled Brutal Fruit Premier Netball League, when she won a man-of-the-match accolade for her goal scoring prowess as the public watched her in admiration and the opposition in frustration.
The towering Amazon’ commanding presence at 2.1 meters tall was supposed to inspire confidence and also provide the catalyst for comprehensive match-winning for the provincial side when she was at the peak of her career.
Invaluably to Limpopo’s new generation of goal shooters, Ngobeni has kept one step ahead.
In many ways – some infamous – she was the archetypal modern netballer with gritty determination.
It is pity she retired from the provincial team with nothing to show off.
She was a member of a team whose campaign was disastrous – they were the whipping girls who never won anything significant.
They finished the league rooted at the basement of the log.
They donated points to the opposition freely and shamelessly.
Explaining why she is retiring while she is still at the peak of her form, Ngobeni spoke briefly of the internal ructions within the Baobabs camp.
“There are lot of nasty things happening in the team. There is bad-mouthing among players. In a nutshell, there is no love lost among some players. I am just sick and tired of this. “However, I will just concentrate of playing club netball” said Ngobeni.