The Sunday Mail
Tinashe Kusema
ZIMBABWE has been given the green light to proceed with preparations to host this year’s World Rugby Under-20 Trophy.
This comes after a successful two-day visit by International Rugby Board representative Simon Kibble, who expressed satisfaction at the work done by the Zimbabwe Rugby Union so far.
Kibble, the IRB’s competitions’ operations manager, was in the country last week and toured health and hotel facilities as well as venues.
“So far so good is all I can say at this point in time,” said ZRU general manager Sifiso Made. “We hosted the world rugby representative for a two-day assessment visit, during which he met up with us to check on our preparedness to host the games.
“He was clocked up in closed meetings with representatives from the ZRU, during the day of his visit, after which we gave him a tour of the venues- the National Sports Stadium and Harare Sports Club- health facilities and hotels.
“We gave him a breakdown of our plans for things like security, anti-doping, internet access and VIP arrangements.
“He seemed pretty satisfied with everything, and we are confident of a very positive assessment in his report,” he said.
Zimbabwe’s bid to host the tournament hinged entirely on Kibble’s visit and assessment.
“There had been fears that we could lose our rights to host the tournament, if Kibble had found us wanting in any department.
“The rules state that if a country is deemed unworthy or incapable of hosting the tournament during the assessment visit, then hosting privileges would automatically fall onto the previous hosts.
“In this case, the previous hosts are Portugal and they would have inherited hosting privileges if Kibble had deemed us unworthy or unprepared.
“Thankfully, that doesn’t seem to be the case and as such you can expect us to go all out for the remainder of our preparations period,” he said.
Kibble’s successful visit was but just the tip of the iceberg for the ZRU.
Last week, Old Mutual Zimbabwe reaffirmed its commitment to supporting junior rugby by sponsoring Zimbabwe’s Young Sables.
“As a natural progression of our own involvement in junior rugby, i am pleased to announce that Old Mutual will be the official sponsor of the Young Sables and the World Rugby Under-20 Trophy that is scheduled for Harare from April 19 to May 1,” said Jonas Mushosho, the Old Mutual Zimbabwe group CEO.
“This is just an insight into what we are doing for rugby in Zimbabwe. We believe the future is bright and commitment to the sport will open doors of opportunity to thousands of boys and girls,” he said.
