Kept in check by tradition, Zimbabwe’s women cricketers focus on future

DOMBOSHAVA, Zimbabwe, Aug 25 (Reuters) – Mitchell Chivare, a 20-year-old who used to play for Zimbabwe’s nationwide junior cricket group, takes her package off the washing line in preparation for her comeback match as a blistering solar beats down on her again yard.

She lives in Domboshava, a city simply north of the capital Harare, and has spent greater than a yr away from the game to have youngsters.

A promising medium-pace swing bowler at one level earmarked for her nation’s senior group, Chivare has been allowed by her husband to start out enjoying once more, however a few of her former team-mates haven’t been so fortunate.

“I’ve a lot of my mates who had been excellent at cricket however they’ve since stopped on account of early marriages. Their husbands are not looking for them to play sports activities,” she advised Reuters.

Concord Kurisa, founder and coach at Domboshava’s Harmonics Cricket Academy, the place Chivare has learnt the sport, tells the identical story.

“We have now misplaced many ladies to early marriages… a few of whom we had groomed for the nationwide group,” he stated.

“Most of them …their husbands forbid them from enjoying. We hope they may come again in the future,” he added, saying three gamers had did not return to the academy previously yr after changing into pregnant.

Chivare stated she married youthful than she anticipated to, giving start to her first baby 18 months in the past and her second two months in the past and “I didn’t have anybody to go away them with when enjoying cricket.”

Now, together with her mom capable of take care of each, she is free as soon as extra to pursue her dream of representing Zimbabwe as a full worldwide. “I consider I’ll come again stronger. I nonetheless have the fervour and the expertise,” she stated.

Early marriages similar to Chivare’s are frequent.

One in three Zimbabwean ladies aged 20 to 49 was married earlier than the age of 18, in response to U.N. company UNICEF, and whereas ladies are legally free to comply with careers, cultural traditions imply many are nonetheless anticipated to play subservient roles inside marriage.

However regardless of such obstacles, ladies’s cricket in Zimbabwe is on the up.

The nation was admitted final yr to the 11-strong elite group of enjoying nations, and the group – together with 17-year-old Concord participant Mitchell Mavunga – are presently in coaching for a T20 World Cup qualifying match within the United Arab Emirates in September.

Enhancing by Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo and John Stonestreet

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