Cheerleading prepares for international bow
Kabelo Boranabi | Saturday December 18, 2021 06:00
The BCF is the newest member of the Botswana National Sport Commission (BNSC) having joined the commission early this year. Now the federation has kickstarted preparations for the 2022 ICU Junior World Cheerleading Championships and the 2022 ICU World Cheerleading Championships.
The two competitions will be held in Florida, US in April next year and it will be BCF’s first ever-international competition in their seven-year existence. Speaking to Mmegi Sport, BCF president, Neo Selwe said the federation was impressed by the good turnout of aspirants on the day. She added that the technical team will select from the group of athletes who will make the national team for the World Championship. “The auditions went very well. We had a good number of athletes who turned up for these auditions. We had a large turnout from the males compared to the females. You see, cheerleading involves a lot of technique and specific skill and that is where the males dominated. We are yet to select the final squad since we finished late on the day. So, we will deliberate and select a team.
From this selection we are not going to call anymore new athletes and we will work on the selected team and ensure thorough preparations ahead of the World Championships,” Selwe said. She further said the P50 audition fee proved to be too steep for some athletes but added that the charge was a way to source funds for the financially depleted federation. “Our ideal target was to attract younger athletes. A number of them turned up but complained about the audition fee. The thing is, the biggest challenge we are facing as a federation is lack of funds. Finances make it difficult for us to run our programmes swiftly, so we use any opportunity we have to source funds.
We have been struggling to acquire a national team uniform but I am glad to announce just recently, we received our uniform from Poland that will take a bit of weight off our shoulders,” Selwe said. In an effort to produce future cheer athletes, Selwe said the BCF will conduct coaching clinics in primary schools around the country. “We want to develop athletes from a young age. So like other sporting codes, our target will be the primary schools. So from early next year we will be going around the primary schools as a way of taking the sport to the young people,” she said.