Hockey coaching clinic slated for Banket

slated for March 17 at Banket Primary School and is targeting school coaches and coaches from the local community in Banket.
The clinic will be conducted by HAZ vice-president, Virginia Ross, who is also in charge of coaches.
Mashonaland Central hockey board president, Humphrey Chigwedere, said the course will deal with the basics of hockey.
“Basically, we want to develop hockey and spread it to schools. We thought the first thing to do was to empower the people who will handle these players.
“This is a capacity-building programme. We want to introduce the game to new coaches so that when we introduce hockey in non-playing schools it is easier for them to teach the basics. We are targeting teachers from both primary and secondary schools.
“We are expecting 25 participants from Mashonaland East and a few from Mashonaland Central because the one that was scheduled for Bindura has been postponed indefinitely due to lack of takers.
“We are going to invite students from Chinhoyi University of Technology. They might bring their students who are in charge of hockey.
“We want people to know the basics of the sport,” said Chigwedere.
Chigwedere said they hope to conduct more courses depending on the success of this month’s clinic.
“If they (participants) do well and manage to establish hockey in their schools then we will conduct more coaching courses.
“This will change the people’s perception on hockey. First, people will appreciate that hockey is like any other sport as long as you know the rules.
“HAZ want to spread hockey to grassroots level and by educating those coaches, we would actually be able to take the sport to the grassroots.
“Last year when we hosted the Olympic qualifiers there was a donation of equipment for the development of hockey and when this equipment comes it should be used properly.
“The only way it can be used is when people know how to use it,” said Chigwedere. He also said that there is need to engage more government schools as they are the most disadvantaged because of lack of resources as compared to private schools.
“Government schools are the most disadvantaged because when they go for competitions sometimes they do not know the rules and they also cannot afford to send their coaches to these courses,” noted Chigwedere.