AFTER making a debut appearance at this year’s continental basketball championships which concluded in Tunisia last week, Zimbabwe men’s basketball team captain Taurai Chitsinde bemoaned lack of high performance facilities as a stumbling block against the team competing well at international level.
BY MUNYARADZI MADZOKERE
Zimbabwe were pitted in Group D at the Afrobasket finals alongside Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Cape Verde, but crashed out in the group stages after losing all their three matches.
The Ellery Pinkerton-coached side also went on to lose to Egypt and Uganda in the final classification matches to finish bottom of the 16-nation standings.
Having had the priviledge of a one-week training camp in Hamburg, Germany, in preparation for their first appearance among Africa’s top 16 basketball nations, Chitsinde believes, Zimbabwe needs to do more to improve local basketball facilities.
“Our camping in Germany was enjoyable; we were exposed to high performance facilities even better than the one we had in Tunisia. In those seven days we had to quickly adapt but it would be nice if in Zimbabwe we can have those kind of facilities available to us,” Chitsinde told Newsday Sport at the Harare International Airport after the arrival of the last batch of players yesterday.
“And once we get used to playing in those high performance facilities then I’m sure we would compete better at these continental championships,” he added.
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Despite a baptism of fire in their maiden dance at the Afrobasket finals which were won by Nigeria, Chitsinde they were looking forward to qualifying for the next edition of the continental championships.
“It was wonderful a wonderful experience and playing against NBA players in my humble amateur status along with some of my teammates was quite an awesome experience,” he said.
“We do not want it to be the last time we play in the Afrobasket finals. We want to remain in the top 16 in Africa, but it won’t be easy,” he added.
