Online Reporter
Ellina Mhlanga
Zimpapers Sports Hub
WITH the Under-20 handball team scheduled to regroup before the end of this month for the African Junior Men’s Championship preparations, coach Tafadzwa Madure says they will do their best to get ready for the event despite limited resources.
The competition is scheduled for September 5 to 12 in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire.
The Zimbabwe Handball Federation announced a provisional squad last week, which is expected to troop into camp from August 24 to September 4 at Highfield 1 High School in Harare.
With the team having last played at the regional tournament in Zambia three months ago, Madure had wanted to have more time with the players. However, lack of resources affected their programme.
“We are supposed to camp from the 24th up until the time we leave.
“We were supposed to get more time camping with the players since we last played some time ago, and we are going to meet up with teams like the hosts and so forth. But at least the 24th is okay; we will work with what is there,” said Madure.
The championship will see 16 countries taking part.
They were divided into four groups of four, and Zimbabwe will face hosts Côte d’Ivoire, Rwanda and Guinea in Group A.
“It’s going to be something else, because we have very little time to prepare, but we should do whatever that we need to do for the boys to get in shape for the tournament.
“So, probably we are just going to load up and then give them recovery time so that they don’t go to the tournament already burned out.
“Most probably we will use the first three days to assess the new additions, new guys that we brought in.
“The next three days we will be working on intense training, and then we will start scaling down in the last three days so that we avoid burn-out before the tournament
“Time is not on our side,” said Madure.
Group B consists of Algeria, Angola, Nigeria and Madagascar, while Tunisia, Libya, Benin and Kenya are in Pool C.
Pool D is made up of Egypt, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo and Congo.
The technical team retained the players who won gold at the International Handball Federation Zone VI Trophy three months ago to earn the ticket to the continental event.
However, they roped in six more players, including some who were part of the Under-18 side that took part in the regional tournament.
“Basically, I think the whole idea is that from Under-20 we have players that we took to Zambia who may be coming back, but we roped in players from the Under-18s so that probably we can have some continuity for 2028.
“We tried to say that, from the 14 that we had, we are introducing six more players from the Under-18s to create competition also, and those that are able to prove themselves will be part of the team.
“I hope there will be some changes because there are some of the boys who went to Zambia who were not performing well.
“But I think some of the boys are stepping up since they know that it’s not like you won and helped the team to qualify, so automatically you are going (to the African Junior Championship).
“There was a tournament hosted in Gweru; I really like the way they stepped up. Probably it’s because they have been given training programmes that they are following,” Madure said.
While the junior men are bracing for the continental event, the senior women’s provisional squad is also scheduled to regroup for a three-day training programme in Harare from this Friday to Sunday.
They are expected to take part in the International Handball Federation (IHF) Nations Trophy Africa — Zone VI Trophy from September 15 to 19 in Lusaka, Zambia.
Their final camp is slated for September 3 to 13.
