By Bockarie Allieu
The organizers of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Africa qualifier have divided the preliminary stage of the qualifier into three sub-regional qualifier.
In the three qualifiers, two countries are to qualify from each group for the next stage to battle with Namibia and Uganda next year to find one country to represent Africa in the Men’s T20 World Cup.
Among them in qualifier A were Cameroun Ghana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mali and Tanzania. The qualifier A which took place recently in Tanzania ended with Tanzania and Malawi qualifying to next stage.
Zimbabwe will host qualifier B in October 2024 where there are Gambia, Kenya, Mozambique, Rwanda, Seychelles and Zimbabwe. Sierra Leone falls in qualifier C together with the host Nigeria, Botswana, Eswatini, Ivory Coast and Saint Helena. The participating teams are expected to arrive in Nigeria on the 19th November 2024. Sierra Leone started the preparation for the above competition few months back with the senior Men’s premier league the U-19 Men’s league.
The two leagues break due to the rains but they have resumed the preparation with the elite league. The technical team divided the players into three teams plus the Asian team.
The four teams play in the elite league over the weekend. The technical team select 24 players who will play in the mid-week trial matches.
According to Cricket board chairman Francis Trevor Samura, they will be cutting down the team early October to start training as a team.
In his address to the players, he said they need nothing less than the champion trophy in the competition. In this case, he has informed them that all players are open for the trials. He went on that the selection will be purely base on the performance of the individual players.
