SA sports team caught up in Mexican gun battle.(News)

BYLINE: JASON WARNER and AZIZ HARTLEY

SA's under-18 ice hockey players had to dive for cover when their team bus "landed in the middle" of a fierce gun battle between Mexican police and gunmen belonging to a drug cartel, but the driver managed to get them away.

The team, with 10 players from the Western Cape, had been in Mexico's second largest city Monterrey to play against Israel and New Zealand in the 2010 International Ice Hockey Federation U18 World Championship Division III at the Monterrey Ice Complex.

After leaving a practice session by bus at noon on Friday, the team encountered a barricade of two abandoned buses blocking the road. Moments …