Shadreck Mlauzi
Grace Chingoma Harare Bureau
THE triumphant Mighty Warriors will know what they will be up against at the 2016 Olympic Games when the draw for the soccer competition will be conducted at Maricana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro today.
The senior women’s national team, who are this week still celebrating their qualification for the Africa Women Cup of Nations, will this afternoon know their opponents at the world’s biggest sporting jamboree which is now four months away.
The 2016 Rio Games are scheduled to run from August 5 to 21 in Rio de Janeiro.
Mighty Warriors assistant coach Sithethelelwe “Kwinji 15” Sibanda and team manager Charity Munemo are in Brazil for the draw as each country from the women’s and men’s soccer teams are represented by an assistant coach as well as the team manager.
These two, after the draw, will then attend a workshop arranged by the organisers before they have site inspection the following day.
Twelve teams would be battling for supremacy in the women’s soccer competition in Brazil and according to Fifa.com the women’s draw has been split into four pots basing on the latest Fifa rankings.
And they would be placed in three groups during today’s draw. The general principle for each tournament’s draw is to ensure that no group has more than one team from each confederation.
According to the latest Coca-Cola Fifa world rankings, which were released on March 25, the Zimbabwe senior women’s soccer team is the worst ranked side at the Olympics on position 95.
Together with South Africa, the other African country that would represent the continent at the Summer Games and is ranked 53rd position, they have been put in Pot Four ahead of the draw which also has Colombia which is ranked 23rd in the world.
Pot One has the world’s best ranked team the United States of America, the second-best team Germany and the eighth-ranked team and hosts Brazil.
The third-best team in the world France, Australia (fifth) and sixth-positioned Sweden make up Pot Two whereas Pot Three has Canada (10th), China (12th) and New Zealand (16th).
Speaking before the draw, Mighty Warriors coach Shadreck Mlauzi said they were ready for any of the teams at this level.
“At this level we’re expecting to play any of the top teams in the world. Of course we’re in Pot Four meaning it’ll be a tough draw because teams are seeded at this level.
“So we’ll play teams that are highly ranked. No matter what comes out, we can’t say it’s going to be an easy draw,” said Mlauzi.
Meanwhile, the Zimbabwe National Soccer Supporters Association founding member Eddie “Mboma” Nyatanga has called on the corporate world to come on board and support the Mighty Warriors following their qualification for the Africa Women Cup of Nations.
Nyatanga said they welcome the move by the government through the Ministry of Sport and Recreation and Zifa to reward the girls. But he urged the corporate world to complement the efforts being made by the Ministry and the local football mother body.
The government gave the team 30 residential stands for their efforts.
“We want to welcome the development by the Minister (Makhosini Hlongwane) and (Philip) Chiyangwa, for what they’ve done for the girl child.
“We want Chiyangwa and the Minister to continue working together. If they can do that nothing can stop us from reaching or scaling greater heights in football.
“Now we’re calling construction companies and those in the business of building materials to assist the girls.
“We’re appealing to them to assist them with building materials. One big construction company can help the girls by building the houses.
“People thought they’re women, they can’t do it but they’ve brought success to the country,” said Nyatanga.
Nyatanga conceded that they have not been doing much in supporting the women’s side.
“As supporters we haven’t been doing much in terms of supporting women’s soccer. We’ve been focusing on men. So we’re saying it’s time we turn our focus to women.
“We’re very proud of what they’ve done. They’ve done well such that we’ll be playing with the world’s best teams in Rio at the Olympics in Brazil in August.
“From now on we’re going to take women’s soccer seriously. We’ll be working with women supporters in the future. We worked together with them before and we want to revive that,” said Nyatanga.