Phumelela Luphumlo Mbande (born 8 March 1993) is a South African

field hockey Field hockey is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with ten outfield players and a goalkeeper. Teams must drive a round hockey ball by hitting it with a hockey stick towards the rival team's shooting ...

player for the South African national team.

International career

She participated at the

2018 Women's Hockey World Cup The 2018 Women's Hockey World Cup was the 14th edition of the Women's Hockey World Cup, a field hockey tournament. It was held from 21 July to 5 August 2018 at the Lee Valley Hockey and Tennis Centre in London, England. Defending champions t ...

. She competed at the

2020 Summer Olympics The , officially the and also known as , was an international multi-sport event held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan, with some preliminary events that began on 21 July. Tokyo was selected as the host city during the 1 ...

. On 23 July 2021, Mbande shared the honour of serving as a flag bearer for

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

, alongside swimmer player

Chad le Clos Chad Guy Bertrand le Clos, OIS (born 12 April 1992) is a South African competitive swimmer who is an Olympic, World and Commonwealth Games champion. He is the African record, Commonwealth record, and South African record holder in the short ...

, at the

Parade of Nations The Olympic Games ceremonies of the Ancient Olympic Games were an integral part of these Games; the modern Olympic games have opening, closing, and medal ceremonies. Some of the elements of the modern ceremonies date back to the Ancient Games from ...

during the opening ceremony of the

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

, Japan.Isaacson, David (22 July 2021)
"Le Clos, Mbande reunite as flag-bearers at Tokyo opening ceremony after 2010 disaster"
''

The Sowetan ''The Sowetan'' is an English-language South African daily newspaper that started in 1981 as a liberation struggle newspaper and was freely distributed to households in the then apartheid-segregated township of Soweto, Johannesburg, Gauteng ...

''. Retrieved April 2, 2022."Chad le Clos, Phumelela Mbande to carry SA flag at Olympics opening ceremony"
'' News24''. 22 July 2021. Retrieved 12 April 2022.Gleeson, Mark (23 July 2021)
"Swimming-More tears for Bert as son Chad carries South African flag"
''

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency was esta ...

''. Retrieved 12 April 2022.Mohamed, Ashfak (23 July 2021)
"Chad le Clos, Phumelela Mbande carry South African flag at Tokyo Olympics opening ceremony"
''

Independent Online ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to Tabloid (newspaper format), tabloid format in 2003. The last p ...

''. Retrieved 12 April 2022.

Personal life

She as external audit manager at

PricewaterhouseCoopers PricewaterhouseCoopers is an international professional services brand of firms, operating as partnerships under the PwC brand. It is the second-largest professional services network in the world and is considered one of the Big Four accounti ...

References

External links

* * 1993 births Living people South African female field hockey players Female field hockey goalkeepers Field hockey players at the 2018 Commonwealth Games Commonwealth Games competitors for South Africa Field hockey players at the 2020 Summer Olympics Olympic field hockey players of South Africa Field hockey players at the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics University of Pretoria alumni 20th-century South African women 21st-century South African women Sportspeople from Pietermaritzburg Field hockey players at the 2022 Commonwealth Games {{SouthAfrica-fieldhockey-bio-stub