Oliver Madzorera, head coach of Madzorera High School girls football team, has vowed his team will go all the way to win this year’s edition of the Copa Coca-Cola Under-17 finals.
The Zvimba-based team won the Mashonaland West provincial finals after beating Neuso Secondary School 2-1 in an exciting final played at Vimbai Secondary School on Saturday.
Maybe Sojasi and the exciting Bianca Mariga scored for Madzorera.
In the boys’ category, Rimuka 2 beat Rainham 1-0 in a provincial final match played at St Erick’s High School on the same day.
Madzorera and Rimuka 2 will now represent Mashonaland West Province at the national finals to be held at Mosi-oa-Tunya High School in Victoria Falls later this month.
At the finals, Madzorera will play in Group D, where they will meet Masotsha and Glen View, representatives of Bulawayo and Harare provinces respectively.
Madzorera said his team had shown a “tremendous” improvement since last year when they crashed out of the tournament at the district level.
“I have been working with the team since 2010 and the improvement is tremendous. The competition was high here, but I expect a more stiffer one at the finals. We will not relax after winning today (Saturday), but will go back and rectify the mistakes we identified here. We will be a complete team at the finals and I promise the cup is going to Mashonaland West this time around,” vowed Madzorera.
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Madzorera, however, bemoaned lack of resources as a major factor that hampered girls’ football development at the school level.
“We are not accorded the same respect as the boys’ team. The administration doesn’t take us seriously, but we are pushing hard so that we can be treated the same way. Credit also should go to Coca-Cola for coming up with this initiative, but I think they should do more for the girls.
“They can sponsor all the schools that reach the provincial level with playing kits because you could see some of the schools had no proper playing kits. Some kids had no soccer boots while their opponents had proper playing gear,” said Madzorera.
