adminEllina Mhlanga Sports Reporter
NATIONAL 21-and-under netball team coach Ropafadzo Mutsauki says his side is making strides in their preparations for the World Championships qualifiers set for Botswana in July.
The team recently concluded a three-week training camp at St Peter’s School in Mbare, which was their first in the build-up to the qualifiers.
The qualifiers will be held in Gaborone from July 23-30 with 10 countries expected to take part.
Besides hosting the qualifiers, Botswana will also host the World Championships next year and they qualify for the event by the virtue of being the hosts. They will be joined by three countries from these qualifiers in representing Africa at the global showcase.
Mutsauki said although the players struggled at the beginning of the training camp, there has been an improvement in terms of their play.
“Firstly, when we started my players were struggling but they improved with time. By the time we concluded our camp, we had a team that could play friendly matches and win.
“We combined the 21-and-under with the Under-20s, who are going to Angola (for the AUSC Region Five Under-20 Youth Games). It was our first camp and the advantage we had is most of the players we have attached them to different clubs to keep them active. And for those in schools, this is the second term and it’s mainly for ball games, so they are all active.
“We started with 27 players and we trimmed them down to 21 and from those 21 we will pick 14 players,” said Mutsauki.
The team is expected to regroup in early July for their final camp and Mutsauki said they will be focusing more on the tactics.
“It’s a good team that we have but remember the teams we are going to face are also preparing for the competition. So we have to step up our preparations a bit. I am expecting about three weeks in camp, maybe from of July 1 until we leave, if all goes well.
“For our first camp we were focusing on combinations because they were already active, so fitness was not much of a problem.
“Of course, they might not have been at their best level but we had somewhere to start in terms of fitness.
“So for our next camp, we will be working on their shooting skills, that’s where we need to work on and the defence as well,” said Mutsauki.
Zimbabwe Netball Association president Leticia Chipandu said she is optimistic Zimbabwe will be among the four countries to represent Africa next year at the world event.
“Botswana have qualified by the virtue of being the hosts and Zimbabwe is going to be one of the countries that are going to qualify. I am positive on that.
“We are hoping they regroup beginning of July up to July 20 because the games are starting on the 23rd. So they will leave on July 21. This is our first shot as a country at the World Championships qualifiers and we should qualify. We are the Region Five champions and it’s almost the same team that is going to compete,” said Chipandu.
Chipandu, who is also Africa Netball vice-president in charge of development, however, noted that it’s not going to be easy since the matches will be played in a round-robin format, with the top three countries qualifying.
“We are going to play in a round-robin format. The winners will be determined by the log standings. It means we are going to play nine countries. It’s going to be very tough.
“Africa is going to field four countries in 2017 in Botswana. So these are test matches to see how prepared they are,” said Chipandu.
The countries expected to take part in the qualifiers are hosts Botswana, Lesotho, Kenya, Ghana, Malawi, Uganda, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Online Reporter