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Blessing Malinganiza Sports Reporter
AN unbeaten century by opening batter Sharne Mayers, was in vain as Zimbabwe lost their final warm-up match against Scotland ahead of the ICC World Cup Global qualifiers, which begin tomorrow in the United Arab Emirates.
The Lady Chevron’s opening batter scored an unbeaten century of 102 off 67 balls.
Her century was not enough to secure Zimbabwe a victory as they lost the match by 32 runs.
Scotland won the toss and elected to bat first, setting a total of 197 runs for the loss of four wickets in 20 overs.
It was a game, that was meant to test the mental strength of the Lady Chevrons, something that their coach Walter Chawaguta has been demanding from his charges.
Chawaguta knows that a tournament such as the Global Qualifier will demand a lot of character for a team to cross the line.
And to their credit, the Lady Chevrons put up a brave fight in their chase.
Mayers scored 102 runs off 67 balls while her opening partner Modester Mupachikwa scored 43 runs off 49 balls.
The duo was to retire in the 20th over hurt, with skipper Mary-Anne Musonda and Pellagia Mujaji coming in to finish off the innings adding seven runs in the last over to hand Zimbabwe a score of 165 runs for no loss of wickets.
Despite putting on the best performance for the team yesterday, which should be a boost ahead of the start of the qualifiers tomorrow, Mayers insisted she was not looking much into the show.
Instead, she remains focused on the ultimate goal of helping the Lady Chevrons to qualify for the 2024 ICC T20 World Cup.
“Our goal is to qualify and that is the overall goal but we will have to take one game at a time,” said Mayers.
Zimbabwe begin their campaign for a World Cup spot with a date against Vanuatu tomorrow.
And Mayers said they would not be taking their opponents for granted even though Vanuatu is not among the cricket giants.
“With Vanuatu, I do remember being in their position many years ago, we do not know much about them and we have to be tactically aware.
“At the end of the day every team here worked hard to get here and we cannot underestimate anyone and we have to take each game as a final because everybody is vying for the World Cup spot,” she said.
Online Reporter