The Sunday News
Mehluli Sibanda, Senior Sports Reporter
ZIMBABWE Cricket have lined up fixtures for both the senior men and women’s cricket team which should see the respective sides busy in the coming weeks.
Gary Brent, the recently appointed national women’s cricket team coach gets his first international assignment when the Lady Chevrons go up against Namibia and Uganda in a triangular Twenty20 International series to be played at Wanderers Sports Grounds in Windhoek from 19 to 27 April.
To choose players for that tour, regional T20 matches are being played in Harare between Southerns and Northerns.
For the senior men’s national team players, matches have been lined up against South Africa A who arrive in the country on 21 April. Hamilton Masakadza, Zimbabwe Cricket’s director of cricket said they have an agreement with their Cricket South Africa counterparts for home and away tours.
“South Africa A are landing on 21 April, they are playing T20s and one dayers. For that tour, we are looking to use national team guys as a build up to the qualifiers that we are hosting. It’s a reciprocal tour, we have an agreement on home and away tours,’’ said Masakadza.
Zimbabwe are preparing for the 2022 ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Global Qualifier B to be staged in the country in July. To prepare for that, the Chevrons are clashing with Namibia in a five-match T20I series while Afghanistan are also heading to Zimbabwe for a limited overs tour scheduled for June.
“As part of the build-up for the T20 World Cup Qualifier, Namibia are also coming down for five T20Is. We are host Afghanistan in June for ODIs and T20Is, just before we get into the qualifiers,’’ he said.
ZC are also in the final stages of finalising a limited overs tour for the Zimbabwe A men’s team to Nepal, likely to take place at the end of April. In terms of domestic cricket, the first class season has been put to bed, with the National Premier League set to get underway on 17 April. – Follow on Twitter @Mdawini_29
