Gonye confident of adequate Olympics preps
ZIMBABWE Olympic Committee president Thabani Gonye says they are doing all they can to ensure athletes are prepared for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
The Games are scheduled for July 26 to August 11. Zimbabwe has two athletes — Isaac Mpofu (athletics) and Stephen Cox (rowing) who have so far qualified. Both athletes are part of the 10 recipients of the Olympic Solidarity Scholarships.
The other athletes on the programme are still in the qualification process.
Gonye said they have classified the two athletes that have qualified to be in a separate tier in terms of the support structure.
“Well, the preparation as a country we start and say, what has happened is we have two athletes that have qualified. That is Isaac and Stephen.
“And in our reconfiguration of preparation at our last general assembly, the information was put in very clearly that we needed to classify the two athletes that have qualified at a separate tier in terms of our support structure. And what we need to do for them, to give them the most enabling preparation plan.
“And that is something that has already been done and we have their budgets that have also been shared with the parent Ministry and they are working to make sure that we are going to do our very best.
“So that’s the first level of tier, of those that have qualified. We have done our best but we can do more with all the partners that are to come on board,” said Gonye.
Mpofu is in camp in Harare under the guidance of seasoned coach Benson Chauke and Cox is training at the Sydney Rowing Club in Australia.
“As for Stephen, we went into a bigger cooperation agreement in which we are working with the Australian NOC and also with partners in Australia.
“So we are very clear, the plan is there. We want these plans not to be only for a few weeks but to be sustained through to the Games.
“So certainly we are very clear about where we are going but we need all the partners to come and support the athletes. It’s really about the athletes,” Gonye said.
The National Olympic Committee is still expecting some of the athletes on the Olympic Scholarship programme to qualify.
They are also working with the likes of South Africa-based marathon runner Rutendo Nyahora, who is set to compete at the Vienna City Marathon in April and they are hopeful some of the athletes based in the United States, make the qualifying standards in various events.
Golfer Scott Vincent is also among the hopefuls.
“We are still expecting a few that we are supporting through the Olympic Scholarship funding. We believe we will still have a few more, I think three or four we still believe can qualify from the various disciplines.
“But we are also looking at a bigger frame of preparation where we know we have several athletes that are in the US. They will have a season, the NCAA season that is coming up. We still expect a few to qualify.
“In Isaac’s preparing and training, he is also training with a few marathoners, which we believe will also create momentum for the marathoners to ride on his preparation to try and qualify. So I will still project that it’s still possible to get several eight.
“We challenged ourselves to double what we had in Tokyo from five to 10. If we fall short, if we get seven, if we get 100 percent, if we get more then the better,” said Gonye.
ALL-ROUNDER Brandon Mavuta has pledged to come back stronger following a recent ban from all forms of cricket after being found guilty of using recreational drugs.
This followed an in-house dope test in December.
Together with fellow all-rounder Wesley Madhevere, Mavuta was last month banned from all cricketing activities for four months. The ZC board also deducted 50 percent of their salary for the three months starting January.
In a post on X, formerly Twitter, the 26-year-old Mavuta said he was looking forward to his rehabilitation ahead of his return to competitive cricket.
“I’m looking forward to joining the high-performance programme to make sure I come back stronger. I sincerely apologise to Zimbabwe Cricket and our supporters and aim to pay you all back with my efforts. Believe No Fear,”he wrote.
This is the second time that Mavuta has publicly apologised for his actions.
Ahead of the Zimbabwe Cricket sanctions last month, Mavuta issued a public apology to the sport’s stakeholders for his actions. “I would like to apologise to all the stakeholders that are involved in my cricket career for the incident that happened in the last month. I am deeply sorry for how my actions affected the brands that I was associated with and the national team at large.
“I want to assure you all that I will not happen again as I now take extra precautions in my actions so that it doesn’t affect my career or the brands I represent. I want to thank all the brands that were associated with me during the period and I also extend my gratitude to the brands that were with me throughout. Now it’s time to focus on my career and do my best for my team Rhinos and the national team.”
This helped his cause a bit as, according to ZC, the decision to ban him for four months factored in the remorse he showed in mitigation.
“In taking the decision, the Committee also considered some mitigating factors, with both players showing remorse and having already started working on withdrawing from the habit and getting their systems clean,” said Zimbabwe Cricket in a statement.
The talented cricketer had slowly turned into a bad boy in recent months.
Last month’s ban followed another sanction on the domestic scene when he was banned for the remainder of the 2023 NPL after causing the abandonment of a match between Kadoma and Amakhosi.
He was also fined US$400 for three offences, including threatening match officials (a Level 1 offence under Article 2.3), bringing the game into disrepute (a Level 2 offense under Article 2.17), and use of audible obscenities towards match officials, which is a Level 2 offense under level 2.22.
The match had to be abandoned after Mavuta refused to leave the crease after being timed out and Amakhosi was awarded the match.
Mavuta was not ready when a wicket fell and took long, beyond the allowed window, to take to the crease.
He was dismissed “timed out” but refused to leave and attempts to engage him were futile as he hurled insults at match officials.
Mavuta argued that he could not be dismissed“timed out”when he had driven from Harare to Kadoma for the match and declared that the match was not going to proceed if they did not overturn his dismissal.
In the end, the match was abandoned. big boost to the squad considering he is one of the best players in the league. KING Nadolo has penned a two-year “He was at the club last season deal with Yadah, moving from TelOne and he showed what he is capable who are returning to the Premier Socof doing. He helped us a lot in many cer League this season via the Zifa difficult situations and made his brilliance Central Region Division One league. count for the team.
The midfielder joined Yadah last “He comes in with a lot of experience season on loan from TelOne on the as he has seen it all in domestic deadline day after he was set to join football and I am quite sure he can be CAPS United. a great addition to any club he joins
He became a crucial member of and we are quite sure the club will the squad in their quest for survival. benefit from his services. Nadolo scored crucial goals for the “The club is also still assessing club including in their 2-1 win against several players and very soon will Dynamos in the final match for them announce our final squad.” to survive relegation. Chatambudza revealed that this season
Nadolo is one of the key players that the club is aiming high as they are will be turning for Yadah in the season tired of fighting relegation and he also they will be officially using The Heart believes having a home stadium will Stadium as their home ground. be a major boost.
Last season Yadah was one of the “As a club, we are tired of fighting clubs that would haphazardly use any relegation every season, and the available stadium in the country to reason why we are looking forward host their games amid the stadia crisis to having a very brilliant season is last season. because we are at a point where we
Club chairman Everson Chatambudza should be saying we are going to finish confirmed the signing of Nadolo in the top four. on a permanent deal. “We will be looking to utilise home
“I can confirm that we signed King advantage as we are going to be using Nadolo on a two-year deal from our stadium and do all due diligence TelOne. Having him at the club is a *that will see us successful,” he said.