adminThe championship will be used to select athletes who will represent Matabeleland South at the Redcliff national finals on 11 February.
Phakamile Lisimati, the chairman of the Matabeleland South Athletics Board, said they were expecting athletes from the six affiliated clubs to take part in the competition.
“Selection for the national cross-country championships is on at Phelandaba Stadium on Saturday and we expect all the clubs from Matabeleland South to compete. The good thing is that two more clubs have joined us and this means that we are going to have a bigger number participating. The new clubs have given us their constitutions and other relevant paperwork. They even attended our annual general meeting last week,” said Lisimati.
The new clubs are Shashane Athletics Academy of Kezi and Plumtree Academy.
Last year Matabeleland South Province Athletics Board had LM Athletics Academy, Blanket Mine, How Mine and Mawabeni, which is under former Zimbabwe 400m great Elijah Nkala.
Lisimati said they were also going to use the National Association for Secondary Schools Heads (Nash) cross-country championships to identify athletes for the province’s juniors’ team.
The Nash cross-country event is on this Friday at Phelandaba Stadium.
According to the National Athletics Association of Zimbabwe calendar, the next event that Matabeleland South is going to hold is a track and field competition that is set for 7 July.
Blanket Mine would be the venue of the competition.
Lisimati said they were going to have a number of invitational events to keep their athletes busy.
Sidumisile Mabena
Online Reporter