By McGeorge Mbare
Dulibadzimu United‘s sensational teen striker,Messi Gushero and SuperSport United’s Nokutenda Mangezi have missed out on the final Zimbabwe U20 squad for the COSAFA tournament set to begin on Thursday.
The two hotshots have missed out for contrasting reasons with the former failing to meet the grade while the latter lost out as SuperSport could not release him for the games as they see him as key to their aspirations with the Pretoria based outfit treatment room showing a long list of injuries.
Even though they are not part of the of the squad, the future seems bright for the young teens as Dulis sensation striker has proved to be one of the emerging young talent from Beitbridge side following his goal scoring form in the Central Region Soccer League. Meanwhile SuperSport United‘s Mangezi is yet to find the back of the net in his new home in South Africa but is highly rated by Matsantsatsa
The Young Warriors will meet Botswana in a Group A fixture at 12 noon that will be followed by a meeting between hosts Mozambique and Eswatini at 3 pm
The group winners and the best-placed runner up will advance to the semifinals.
The two finalists will qualify for the Afcon finals next year.
Mighty Warriors will be eager to qualify for the 2025 edition. In U20 history Zimbabwean lastly won the U20 championships in 2007 after defeating South Africa (3.0) , following up their recent years defeat by South Africa in 2018 in the final after a tense penalty shout out.
The fixture of mighty warriors is as follows
Zim U20 fixtures
26 September – Zimbabwe vs Botswana at 12 noon CAT.
28 September – Eswatini vs Zimbabwe at 12 noon CAT.
30 September – Mozambique vs Zimbabwe at 3 pm CAT