Tadious Manyepo-Zimpapers Sports Hub
Mauritius . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .(1)1
Zimbabwe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .(4)4
(Zimbabwe win 6-1 on aggregate)
Zimbabwe’s Under-23 side pasted their credentials right on the wall when rolling over Mauritius in the second leg of this first-round of 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games qualifier at the Côte d’Or National Sports Complex in Saint Pierre last night.
Already carrying a 2-0 lead into the decisive game, the Young Warriors showed they had the method too, just to prove their commanding display from the reverse fixture at the National Sports Stadium last Wednesday was no fluke.
Teenage forward Elisha Pfupa led the demolition with a hat-trick that was topped up by David Chigwada’s wonder goal at the end of the opening half.
Jean Joucoeur tapped in the home team’s consolation goal also in the first half, which was high on intensity and sheer determination from both sides.
Marc Sanchez’s side will now face Mali in November, after which the winners between either Eswatini or Malawi and Algeria will lie in wait should Zimbabwe manage to dump the Malians.
Should they be successful in surmounting both hurdles, the Young Warriors will then book their place in the 12-team Under-23 Africa Cup of Nations scheduled for Egypt next year, from which the best two teams will punch tickets to Los Angeles in 2028.
That is a long, winding road to what will be their first-ever Olympic Games appearance, but there is every reason to be optimistic about their chances given the way they pummelled Mauritius.
The gulf in quality between the two opponents was beyond question, with Zimbabwe dominating in all the key aspects and literally pitching camp in their opposition half throughout the game.
The excellent fusion of the foreign brigade with local-based players by the coach is refreshing, and the team will be hinging their hopes of getting past the next opponents on their newly found chemistry and telepathy.
Pfupa coolly took his first goal inside the first quarter of an hour to settle the Young Warriors’ nerves before heading in a perfectly lofted Seth Chingwaro cross four minutes later.
That helped the visitors to start enjoying their game, with Sanchez’s tactical masterclass playing out before a cheering crowd of mostly Zimbabweans living in Mauritius.
The support was massive and, if anything, the Young Warriors felt as much as if they were the home team, and their own performance seemed to contextualise it all.
Even when Joucoeur halved the deficit for Mauritius five minutes after Pfupa’s second goal, it looked to be no way Zimbabwe would ever allow them back into the game.
The Young Warriors had to be disciplined, maybe a bit, just to manage their opponents who had obviously been lifted after getting their goal.
But like real ballers, Zimbabwe restored their two-goal cushion, with Pfupa’s diving header off a Richard Nkomo cross putting them out of reach.
But the young Zimbabweans were not yet done, with Chigwada rifling home from inside the box just to confirm their passage into the next round.
But then all the aura left the game in the second half, with a submissive Mauritius turning physical, clipping, rather crudely, the likes of Pfupa and Prosper Padera who might just have suffered bad injuries in the end.
But besides that and some glaring misses from Zimbabwe, the game was done, and what the visitors had to do was manage it out, which they did commendably well.
Sanchez was excited, and rightly so, at the sound of the final whistle.
“I am happy with the performance from my boys,” he said.
“We played well, and the players showed a lot of depth and intelligence inside the field of play.
“We knew the Mauritians would come at us and try to overturn the 0-2 deficit they had from Harare.
“But well done to my boys. We looked for an early goal and got it. We unsettled them in the process, and here we are.”
There were ugly scenes at the end of the match as frustrated Mauritius players tried to attack the Zimbabwean players, with the Young Warriors’ technical team ordering the players to rush to the tunnel before saluting the fans.
The next assignment will certainly be tricky against continental age-group giants Mali, but Sanchez would rather cross the bridge when he gets there. For now, the Young Warriors, who have fallen in love with the country, can enjoy their place in the sun.
