Cheetahs’ difficult fortnight ends with silverware

and returned home as the best side among the also-rans in the International Rugby Board Sevens Series tournaments.
They won the Shield in South Africa.
Having left the country two weeks ago for the Dubai leg of the IRB Sevens, the Zimbabwe side were hopeful that they will surpass last year’s performance in both the Dubai and South Africa tournaments.
The Cheetahs rounded off their tour with a Shield win in South Africa but definitely, this was not one of their best performances in recent IRB events after losing all their Pool D games and finishing bottom of the group.
It was not only the defeats that mattered but the nature of the losing margins.
They lost 7-42 to Wales in their opening game of the tournament, 17-42 to Fiji before a 12-24 loss to Portugal.
The results meant that the Cheetahs were not good enough to make it for the top-tier knock out stages and they went on to play in the Bowl quarter-final where they also suffered a 7-41 defeat to the United States.
The Cheetahs were demoted to play in the Shield semi-final where, again, they suffered a 12-21 loss to Samoa, marking the end of the road for the side.
This was not the first time that Zimbabwe were losing by margins this big because a week earlier in Dubai, also in the group stages, the Cheetahs only managed one win to finish third in the four-team Pool C.
Then they also started the show, on the wrong footing following a 0-43 thumping at the hands of eventual winners England, a 0-26 defeat to France before the Cheetahs ended the opening day with a 21-5 win over Kenya.
Having registered only one win over Kenya in the Dubai tournament, the Cheetahs crossed over to South Africa from Dubai with the intention of playing better rugby.
Zimbabwe lost all the group games to finish bottom of Pool D and as was the case in Dubai, they also met the United States in the Bowls quarter-finals, but this time they reduced the losing margin following a 0-26 defeat.
They dropped into the next tier and where they got their first win in Port Elizabeth with a 21-14 victory over Morocco.
This set them on track to defend the Shield title they won in George last year.
The Cheetahs confidence levels clearly improved as they had earned a ticket into the Shield final against Kenya – who they had also beaten in Dubai in a similar competition.
This made it Zimbabwe’s fourth consecutive win over Kenya, inside a year.
However, every dark cloud has a silver lining and for manager Bruce Hobson it is the commitment of the players that matters most “so long as they give a 100 percent in their act”.
Wes Mbanje finished among the top try scorers sitting on number nine, tied with four others with who had four tries each.
He was also Zimbabwe’s top points scorers but sat on number 23 on the tournament’s top points scorers’ charts.
In their final matches of the tournament, the Cheetahs gave a run out to most of the fringe players such as university student Mike Morris who came in as a replacement for captain Jacques Leitao.
“We all know that we are not a professional side and all the sides we were pitted against in both Dubai and South Africa are professional sides.
“We definitely do not have depth in our side, in one game we let in two or three easy tries, and we did not have Jacques, Danny Hondo and Fortune Chipendu (injured) while Gardner (Nechironga) was not 100 percent (fit).
“We had no option but to start players like Mike Morris and Tafadzwa Chitokwindo, who are still in university, playing against the pros but it is good for us because we were also giving them exposure.
“So that makes a big difference between us and the professional sides.
“We still have a lot of work to do because in as much as we step up our game, the professional sides double stepped.
“When we left Zimbabwe I expected that we would do well but the level was so high and there were no easy teams in both tournaments. At the end of it all we saw where we stand and what needs to be done as we prepare for the next events,” said the former Zimbabwe Rugby Union president.
The Cheetahs’ next IRB tournament will be in Hong Kong in May and they are expected to be active before this international event if they are to put on a better show in Asia.