Karatekas honoured

Ellina Mhlanga Sports Reporter—

THE Zimbabwe full contact team continues to shine as they were recently honoured for being the best team at the Africa Full Contact Karate Organisation 2016 Awards in Johannesburg, South Africa.The awards were organised by Karate South Africa and the other countries that were considered are Botswana, Zambia and Swaziland.

ZKU technical director for full contact, Kumbirai Musinami, said they feel honoured to realise there are people who recognise their efforts.

“The organisers are Karate South Africa. They have their own sponsors, so in conjunction with their sponsors they did an analysis on which karate team has been doing well. We were fortunate the selection was covering the whole of Southern Africa.

“They were looking at consistence of participation in tournaments and consistence in winning medals because some teams participate and win medals then the following year they don’t.

“It’s a good consolation to receive an award, just to know that there are some people that are appreciating that you are doing well. We are motivated and we are looking at doing better next year,” said Musinami.

The ZKU technical director believes the awards is an indication they are on the right track as they prepare to host their first international tournament next year.

The union has hosted the All-Africa So-kyokushin championships twice as they seek to establish a platform for bigger tournaments locally.

“It just goes to show that we are very competitive, in terms of our level of organisation we are doing extremely well. If you look at South Africa and Botswana, they have the resources and they send the teams wherever they want.

“Because of our economy we don’t have such resources but in such a situation we have managed to send our athletes for tournaments.

“It shows we have reached a high level in terms of organisation and we will seek to scale greater height. We have a World tournament next year and this confirms we are in the right direction,” said Musinami.

Musinami said as the year comes to an end, they are happy with their achievements for this year and are already looking into the future.

“This year has been quite difficult in terms of sponsorship but I am glad we fulfilled all our competitions although with less numbers. In terms of success I think we were equally good because we managed to attend those events and won medals.

“So I think with better funding we can do much better. Next year we will keep our gears up and try to attend all tournaments. We will also try to out mechanisms to raise funds for our athletes and we are hoping to send more people for tournaments.

“Actually it’s important for us to participate next year in light of the international tournament we are going to host. We need to send get our athletes ready, so next it’s going to be very busy, it’s going to be challenging actually,” Musinami said.