Cheetahs trials draw 45 players

Ronald Mashinga, Sports Reporter

THE two-day Cheetahs sevens rugby selection trials held at Hartsfield ground in Bulawayo last weekend drew 45 players.

The trials will also be conducted at other rugby centres across the country, paving the way for national trials that will be conducted in Harare on January 18 and 25.

Holding regional and provincial trials is aimed at ensuring all rugby players countrywide get an opportunity to claim a spot in the national side as well as to unearth new talent from the grassroots level.

Cheetahs head coach Gilbert Nyamutsamba attended the weekend trials and was impressed with the number of players that attended.

“We had a good start to our sevens’ programme and I am happy to have been part of the Bulawayo provincial trials. I am sure Mutare and Midlands are on their way to conducting pre-selection trials and hopefully, Hwange and Harare are joining in. I am confident that come the 18th, we are going to have a large group of players that want to be part of the sevens’ side,” said Nyamutsamba.

“This is the only way we can grow the sevens brand and the only way we can get more players that we can feed into future teams. Every year when we start like this to identify new talent, it’s an exciting time that we get to see new talent coming into our structures,” he said. 

The Cheetahs are building a squad that will compete in the 2020 Olympic Qualifiers in Columbia in June. 

They finished third in the Africa Men’s Seven Rugby tournament, which saw them making it for the Olympic qualifiers where they’ll be joined by Uganda.

Champions Kenya join South Africa, who qualified automatically by virtue of finishing as one of the top four teams at the end of the 2018/2019 HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series.