Online Reporter
Veronica Gwaze
Zimpapers Sports Hub
THE Zimbabwe senior netball team, the Gems, are proving to be a force to reckon with globally after they retained 11th place on the latest World Netball Rankings.
The standings were released by World Netball yesterday.
They take into consideration results from matches played between March 1 and June 1, this year.The Gems are among the 27 top-ranked nations who maintained their positions.“Managing to maintain a position on the world rankings is every association’s dream and as Zimbabwe we are thoroughly impressed with what we have done,” said Zimbabwe Netball Association Technical Director John Banda.
“We moved to position 11 some few months ago and staying in that position takes a lot because competition up there is stiff.
“You have to double your work rate to remain among the world’s best but generally. as Zimbabwe, it shows that we are in the right direction as we aim for a position among the top 10 nations.”
For years, Zimbabwean players were virtually on the sidelines with international scouts largely interested in players from the top 12 ranked nations.
Former Gems captain, Felisitus Kwangwa, became the first Zimbabwean to land an international move in 2020 after the team’s impressive World Cup debut in 2019.
She spent three seasons with England’s Surrey Storm before tracing her footsteps back home to rejoin Correctional Queens.
Since then, international moves have been elusive and maintaining a position in the top 12 ranked nations could be a huge opportunity for Zimbabwean players to finally lure meaningful attention. “We want to see more of our players landing international moves and the only way we can achieve that is to stay in good position on the world rankings,” said Banda. “Our major challenge back then was funding, we could not participate in many ranking tournaments so we remained with low points.
“Since the coming in of Nedbank as our sponsors and, of late Caledonia Mining, life has been better because we are able to participate in more tournaments and acquire points, hence the improving rankings.”
Banda also attributed The Gems’ rise to a vibrant developmental policy.
“If we trace back to the team that qualified and did duty at Zimbabwe’s senior World Cup debut in Liverpool in 2019, the bulk of the players had graduated from the juniors’ structures,” he said. “Among those players, we also had those who played in the Youth Netball World Cup in Botswana in 2017; this is a model of doing business that we have kept to this day and it is paying dividends.
“We went on to buttress that system by creating the Zambezi Eagles team, which comes as a buffer between the juniors and seniors, meaning that one can graduate from juniors to Zambezi and then earn promotion into the Gems side based on performance. Ideally, some of the players who fail to make it into the Gems, we have a plan of training and integrating them into various roles that they can be good at, for example, administration, etc.”
International friendly games and invitational tournaments have transformed The Gems into a feared side that has even upset African giants Malawi and Uganda several times.
Banda said more international exposure has been instrumental in The Gems’ transformation journey.
Mathew Masinge