Online Reporter
Tinashe Kusema
Zimpapers Sports Hub
SABLES coach Piet Benade has slipped into a quiet rhythm since the Rugby World Cup draw was rolled out last week.
It is the kind of silence that hints at a man already deep in his notebooks, replaying possibilities in his head, letting the gravity of the next two years sink in.
Zimbabwe will walk into Pool F in 2027. England, Wales and Tonga wait there.
It is a pool that mixes history, muscle and memory, and it drops the Sables into the heart of the global game with no soft landing.
The expanded 24-team format leaves little room for comfort. Only the top two sides from each pool reach the last 16, with four of the best third-place finishers joining them.
Every match becomes something heavier than a fixture. Every moment can tilt a nation’s campaign.
For Zimbabwe, this is a rare and difficult stage, and it comes with the realisation that the margins are now tighter than ever.
Old rivalries have shaped parts of this pool. England and Wales will meet again on the World Cup stage after their tight 28-25 contest in 2015.
England have swept Tonga three times, including a century of points in 1999. Wales edged Tonga in 1987 and 2003.
Even Zimbabwe’s own place in this web carries its own story.
The Sables will meet three new opponents at a World Cup, the most they have ever faced, and for the first time they will stand opposite a Pacific Islands team.
Their last meeting with Tonga was in Harare, where the visitors ran out 42-13 winners three decades ago. That memory lingers, but time has given the fixture a new edge.
Benade has been taking all of this in. He knows exactly what this draw asks of him and his players.
There was pride in that moment, but reality arrives quickly.
He and skipper Hilton Mudariki see a landscape that will shift between now and 2027.
Form and confidence rise and fall. Teams rebuild. Injuries come. Structures change. The Sables have space to grow, but the giants in their group do as well.
The Sables’ next steps unfold in the shadow of all this.
Six Test matches lie ahead at the minimum.
They will come through the new World Rugby Nations Cup, a tournament built for teams headed for Australia in 2027, a way to sharpen old combinations and discover new ones.
The competition mirrors the Nations Championship at the top tier and fills the July and November windows in 2026 and 2028.
Zimbabwe sit among Canada, Chile, Georgia, Hong Kong China, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Tonga, Uruguay, the United States and Samoa.
Their group reads like a road map. Tonga again. The United States. Canada. Different styles. Different threats. But also chances to gather clues and build confidence.
The Tonga meeting in particular offers a preview of what is in store in the World Cup pool, a rehearsal wrapped inside a genuine Test.
Preparation begins at home too.
Benade and his staff are trying to keep the local pipeline alive, knowing that continuity will matter.
“We are working hard behind the scenes to confirm early-season fixtures for our locally based players to ensure they continue to have pathways to play for the Sables with our cross-border neighbours Botswana and Zambia, who played a big part in our preparation this year,” he said.
“In June, we are hoping to invite Kenya, Namibia and Uganda to come and play in Zimbabwe so our local fans can see some top continental clashes here at home.
“The June Test matches will serve as preparation for the Nations Cup matches in July against Tonga, USA and Canada.
“So, a very exciting first six months of the new year lie ahead. We are also looking to do a physical screening and testing with our local players in the second week of December, before the boys are given individual conditioning targets to hit by January, where we will start working in the gym at the end of the first week of January.”
The silence around Benade no longer feels mysterious. It feels like a man taking stock before the noise arrives.
He has two years to turn a promising squad into a hardened group capable of standing up to England’s precision, Wales’ systems and Tonga’s power.
The draw has given Zimbabwe a map, but the journey will be made in these quiet days, in the planning, in the conditioning, in the Tests that sit between now and the biggest stage the Sables have seen in decades.
