adminEllina Mhlanga Senior Sports Reporter
THE Zimbabwe Under-20 handball team’s assistant coach Tafadzwa Madure says they are facing a dilemma building up to the International Handball Federation Trophy Zone VI tournament in October as some of the players may not be available due to school commitments.
The regional event is scheduled for October 17 to 23 in Harare with the Under-20s and Under-18s competing.
The competition was initially set for April but there were several changes to the dates before it was moved to October.
Zimbabwe’s provisional squads met last week for a five-day camp to continue with their preparations but Madure said some of the players they are targeting will be writing their Ordinary and Advanced Level exams then.
“The tournament is going to be at the same time as the exams, so we have noted quite a number of our players who will be writing exams. So we are working on a make-shift.
“We were supposed to have 30 players, then trim them to 20 and then have a selection of the final 14 in the first week of October.
“But now we are not going to scale down the numbers, we are going to keep on working with all of them until we know who will be available. It’s a major setback,” said Madure.
Madure said the camp went on well and will work to ensure they have a strong team in place by the time the tournament begins despite the setback.
The teams were staying at Girls High School and training at Chitungwiza Aquatic Complex.
“We managed to have a friendly match with Manyame Falcons so that we could analyse and assess how we are progressing. Since we are camping with the Under-18s, we also managed to have a game with them on the final day as well.
“It would have been good to play outside the country and get exposure but because of financial constraints we will play our senior clubs.
“The group we are dealing with was affected by Covid-19, the lockdowns, there were no competitions so they were idle for about two years. So we had to teach them the basics and then the new trends of handball because our game keeps on changing.
“They are responding well to the concepts but we need more games to implement what we are doing and make corrections. So we are going to have more friendly matches so that they get exposure,” said Madure.
Zimbabwe Handball Federation secretary general Edson Chirowodza said they have made progress in their preparations to host the regional tournament.
The IHF have confirmed the supervisor and technical delegates for the tournament.
“We are progressing as IHF has confirmed the supervisor for the tournament from Egypt Mr Medhat Elbeltagy, technical delegates Diabate Mamoudou (from) Cote d’Ivoire and Allade Jonas (from) Benin.
“And a list of 12 referees drawn from Benin, Congo, Cote d’Ivoire, Gabon, Morocco and Tunisia.
“We are working as LOC to finalise with service providers and all is set. This time around the tournament must go on,” said Chirowodza.
Participating countries are expected to submit their provisional lists of 28 players by September 28. This will also give a clear picture of the total number of countries that are going to attend.
“We are expecting eight countries and we will get actual confirmations when the provisional lists will be submitted on the 28th of September,” said Chirowodza.
The national junior and youth teams took advantage of the school holidays to cover some ground work. They are set to regroup again before the end of this month.
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