Despite the warriors struggling in other tournaments such as the Africa Cup of Nations or World Cup qualifiers, the COSAFA Castle Cup is the one tournament where the Warriors achieved success. The Warriors are four-time COSAFA Castle Cup Champions.
The Warriors have to work their way through the preliminary round group stage for the third successive year in South Africa’s North West province from the 25th of June to the 9th of July. On paper, according to FIFA World Rankings, Zimbabwe are ranked above their group opponents except Mozambique.
Zimbabwe face Mozambique in their opening group encounter of the 2th of July. Two days later the Warriors date Madagascar before concluding their group campaign against Seychelles on the 30th of July.
The group winner will qualify for the knock-out stages where they will meet seeded Swaziland in the quarterfinals.
Group A consists of Angola, Malawi, Tanzania and Mauritius with the winner booking a place against South Africa in the quarterfinals.
13 of the 14 regional block’s nations will take part this year, with only the Comoros Islands withdrawing their name from the draw. They were replaced by Tanzania.
Last year Zimbabwe were knocked out during the preliminary round group stage of the competition were they were draw in that featured Seychelles, Swaziland and Madagascar. zifmnews.com
