Zim U17 Football Girls Yet To Camp

By Gilbert Munetsi
The Zimbabwe U17 girls’ football squad is yet to go into camp ahead of the Zone 5 Youth Games penciled in for Setsoto Stadium in Maseru (Lesotho) early December this year.

Placed in Group A, Zimbabwe has been drawn against Botswana who they play on December 1st, Zambia (Dec 4) and the Comoros on December 6.

The semifinals will be played on December 7, with the finals scheduled for December 9.

Namibia, Mauritius and South Africa will compete in Group B.

Sources in Zim women football confided to Nhau that there had earlier been indications that the girls would not participate in the regional football showcase owing to financial challenges.

However, the powers that be at the Sports Ministry had insisted all efforts be made to ensure the country was represented.

Contacted for comment, team manager Debra Magura was not sure when they would receive the green light to go into camp yesterday, but said the selection process has been ongoing.

“We have visited the provinces as part of the selection process and have been privileged in that we still have the team that played in the COSAFA tournament intact.

“A couple of weeks back during the Midlands Agricultural show week, we also had an U17 girls’ soccer tournament from which we were able to identify a number of potentials.

“We have since been trimming the numbers to the required size and hope to complete the process as soon as we are in camp,” she said.

With the men’s national team all but out of contention in the World Cup qualifiers and the Mighty Warriors faring dismally in the recently ended COSAFA competition, the soccer gods seem to have turned a blind eye on anything football in this country.

While the blame has been piled on administrators for the lack of adequacy in preparing for forthcoming tournaments, tradition has always been for the concerned teams to be subjected to haste camp programmes. Nhau/Indaba