Hockey In P500, 000 Shortfall
Kabelo Boranabi | Monday June 22, 2020 12:55
Including the Africa Cup of Nations, which serves also as World Cup qualifiers for Under-18 hockey, BHA is to compete at the senior Southern Africa Cup (Africa Cup of Nations Qualifiers) and the Field Hockey Series.
'We are looking at a budget that could exceed half million. We are looking six teams here, both the seniors and under-18 and they will have both men and women teams. But at the moment, it is difficult to do anything at moment. We are looking at the government for assistance, and we are yet to know how much we are going to get,' BHA president, Unaswi Matengu told Monitor Sport. She further said the teams have halted training since the government stopped all sporting activities in March. She said BHA is yet to return to training but said the national teams will not miss an international tournament.
'We are yet to receive new dates on the tournament that was supposed to be played in June. Preparations are going to need more money. Players have been inactive for the last two months, so they are not at the level we would want them to be. We had asked them to train individually but that it is not enough. We cannot afford to miss any international tournaments at the moment. In 2018 we had stopped participation in any international competition, as we wanted to restructure the national teams. If we miss, it is going to negatively affect our players psychologically, so we cannot afford to miss any and all these need a lot of funding,' Matengu said.
She also said the association is working on revising the calendar after being affected by COVID-19.