Over the weekend, the Botswana Under 15 team will be travelling to Bulawayo to go up against a much stronger contender, Zimbabwe, as a form of gearing up for the upcoming International Cricket Council (ICC) Africa Regional Under 15 Southern Division Tournament.
The Regional tournament, in which Botswana is a participant, is to be held in Benoni, South Africa during the first week of December from the 4th until the 7th.
The Botswana Cricket Association (BCA) said that it believes that playing against a stronger side will help the Botswana team immensely in their preparations for the tournament.
Initially the upcoming tournament was expected to involve countries like the host South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland as well as Zambia. Today however, only four teams remain after four were recently disqualified due to suspension of all member services to Malawi, Lesotho and Zambia teams.
According to Senior Development Co-ordinator of ICC development Africa, Graham McMillan, in a statement written to the four remaining countries, the regional office decided that the tournament should proceed despite the suspensions.
“The regional office felt that, although the tournament is made up of such a small number, we should not be punishing the compliant members, so the tournament will still go ahead.
The final dates of the tournament will be the fourth, fifth and sixth of December 2010,” said McMillan.
On day one, Botswana is expected to start the kick-off match against Mozambique in the morning and then compete against cricket heavyweights, Namibia, in the afternoon of the same day.
On the second day, the team will be playing against Swaziland; the knock-offs are on the third day.
