Ellina Mhlanga, Sports Reporter
MIGHTY Warriors assistant coach Sithethelelwe “Kwinji 15” Sibanda says the ongoing camp for the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, presents them with an opportunity to assess other players who have not been featuring regularly for the senior national women’s soccer side in their past assignments.

The Mighty Warriors started trooping into camp on Sunday and by Tuesday all the 30 players called up had reported for national duty at the ZIFA Village.

Zimbabwe have qualified for two major competitions – the Olympic Games scheduled for August in Brazil and the Africa Women Cup of Nations to be held in Cameroon later this year.

Following their qualification for the Africa Nations Cup last month, they have shifted their focus to the immediate task, which is the Olympics.

Sibanda feels now that they are focusing on the Olympic Games unlike in their previous camps where the team was also targeting qualification for the Africa Cup of Nations, they can experiment with some of the players.

Players such as young striker Maud Mafuruse, who has been called to the team before but didn’t make it into the final team, have the chance to challenge the senior players in the squad.

“Last time it was difficult to try some of the players because we had to qualify (for the Africa Cup of Nations) and there was no time to experiment. So we want to see how other players can do and improve their match fitness.

“We wish to play a couple of friendly matches where we do not give players just one match to assess them. We can do that in several matches to see who can go to the Olympics.

“It’s not like a completely new side, we have been working on the players but some of them we did not give them the chance to play because we were under pressure in the qualifiers.

“With friendly matches our aim is to play some of the players and expose them to such matches rather than expose them to games where the team is under pressure to qualify. We had to use experienced players,” said Sibanda.

Sibanda said now that they know the teams they are going to play in the group stages at the Rio Games, they have to prepare themselves according to the challenge they are going to face.

“We will be particularly focusing on the Olympic Games now that the draw is out. We know the teams we are going to play. So we are focusing on our group, it’s high level competition. We want to improve on the fitness level.

“Firstly, we are concentrating on the tactical approach, we need to improve our strength. Get friendly matches so that we can try some of the players. We are playing in a tournament where player rotation is very important,” said Sibanda. Zimbabwe, who will be making their debut appearance at the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, are in Group F together with two-time World Cup winners Germany, Canada and Australia.

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