Mangongo unhappy with U-19 World Cup Scheduling

Zimbabwe U 19 coach, Stephen Mangongo has expressed his dissatisfaction with the contrasting travel schedules, matches on alternate days and little downtime between games. Notably, they had only one rest day in between matches against Australia and India in which they had to fly out from Christchurch to Tauranga and then watch their only training session called off because of rain.

Mangongo further raised that it has hampered his teams’ preparation in the ongoing ICC 22018 U 19 World Cup.

India on the other hand, had enjoyed plenty of rest after taking little more than three hours to beat Papua New Guinea on Tuesday. They have had an opportunity to climb the Mount, go out for shopping, watch the Indian hockey team beat Japan in a four-nation tournament. They also had light pool sessions and even enjoy a day out at the cricket: they were at Bay Oval to watch South Africa take on West Indies.

Apart from Zimbabwe, Namibia and Canada also have had games scheduled on alternate days in different cities.

“It is a very tough scenario. We play a game, we recover, we travel, we have team meetings and before you know it, we are at a game next day,” Mangongo said.

Terming this situation ‘unfair’, Mangongo admits they will ask the board to raise this at ICC.

“We believe it’s unfair, absolutely unfair. India has been resting, they’re ready. We would definitely raise that with our MD (managing director), our board, and when they go back to ICC, these anomalies have to be sorted out. There’s no team that is bigger than the other. We’re all Under-19 youth cricketers and we must be treated equally,” he added further.

However, India isn’t the only team enjoying the luxury of playing all their group matches at one venue. England, Kenya, Ireland, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka too have had all their group matches scheduled at a single venue.

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