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Tendai Tagara

Sikhumbuzo Moyo, Senior Sports Reporter
THE National Athletics Association of Zimbabwe (Naaz) is looking beyond the African Senior Athletics Championships that get underway in Nigeria on Wednesday hence they have sent a team of youngsters.

They want to use the champions to prepare for the 2019 African Games as well as the 2020 Olympic Games.

The 21st edition of the African Senior Athletics Competition will run from August 1-5.

The 2019 African Games were supposed to be hosted by Equatorial Guinea but the Association of National Olympic Committees of Africa (ANOCA) had to move them to Morocco after the pullout of Equatorial Guinea.

Naaz sent a team of eight athletes, who are coached by Lisimati Phakamile, who expressed satisfaction with his team’s preparations ahead of departure for Nigeria yesterday.

Naaz president Tendai Tagara said their target was mainly the forthcoming African Games that will be hosted by Morocco and the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.

“We sent a team of largely Under-20 athletes as we are preparing for next year’s African Games and the Olympics in 2020. However, we remain confident that the senior guys that we also drafted in will do well,” said Tagara.

Phakamile said they expect one or two medals, especially in the sprints.

“Generally the whole team prepared well for the meet and we are looking forward to giving a good account of ourselves,” said Phakamile.

Team Zimbabwe is made up of Faith Dube, Ngoni Makusha, Dickson Kapandura, Rodwell Ndlovu, Leon Tafirenyika, Tatenda Tsumba, Nyasha Mutsetse and Maryjoy Mudyiravanji.

He said Mutsetse will compete in the 800m as well as 4x400m relay, whose other team members are Tafirenyika, Ndlovu and Kapandura.

Tsumba, Ndlovu, Kapndura and Makusha will also compete in individual 200m races, with Makusha and Tsumba also running the 100m sprints.

Ndlovu and Tafirenyika will be fielded in the 400m individual races while Dube will compete in the 200m and 400m races. Mudyiravanji will compete in the 800m event.