In their efforts to forge a strong national team that will represent the country beyond 2018,Botswana Table Tennis Association (BTTA) hosted International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) Expert Coach Mohammad Delwartely from Egypt to conduct a five days training camp for local youth under the age of 23 across the country.
The training camp, that ended Friday, was staged at Botswana College of Agriculture (BCA) in Sebele. It enrolled 20 of the country’s best youngsters in the sport in order to equip them with necessary skills and tactics to enhance their game.
BTTA Competitions Manager Kudzanai Motswagole said they aim to improve their world rankings by competing for medals in regional and international tournaments.
“It is important that we increase our international competitiveness. It’s high time we competed for medals and titles because it helps us to get recognition from our mother body ITTF which we usually depend on for financial support” he said.
Botswana will host the 2017 Zone 6 championships and BTTA has set itself a target of at least five medals from their target group which was divided into 3 age clusters (13-15, 18-20 and 20-22 years).
“The team that was in camp is the same team that we want to use in the upcoming tournaments. Transition of players is key more especially looking at the fact that the current top players are ageing”, added Motswagole.
The training camp will be followed by an ITTF Level 1 Coaching Course that is expected to start today (17th April) until the 21st at Botswana College of Agriculture (BCA) Multipurpose hall which will pit three coaches from BTTA affiliated clubs. The course will also be conducted by Delwartely.
BTTA will end their 10 day programme by hosting the Conductors Coaching Course which aims on producing local coaches who qualify to conduct such courses.
“ it is important that we have our own qualified coaches who will be able to conduct these courses locally, because we spend a lot of much money in hosting these international experts time and again even though we benefit a lot in terms of development that’s why our efforts are on course” Motswagole noted.
Mohammad Delwartely is a former African champion in table tennis and holds numerous of international qualifications in Table Tennis and he is expected to leave the country next week.
