You would recall that our Men’s Senior National team, the Zebras, recently lost 0-1 away to Comoros in a qualifier match for the 2017 Gabon AFCON, but reversed that result with a 2-1 win at home. The team had in the same competition in the past year lost 0-2 away to Uganda before beating Burkina Faso 1-0 at home in the City of Francistown. We are currently in the third position of the log after Burkina Faso and Uganda; both of which we still have to play for the second leg; starting with Uganda on the 4th of June here in the City of Francistown before taking on Burkina Faso away on the weekend of 2nd/3rd/4th September to complete the qualifiers. As things stand now, both Burkina Faso and Uganda have seven points each, we have six. All we need to do is to beat both, then we are 12 points, in which case each one of them would only reach ten points.

We no doubt take both teams seriously, and are doing our best to have our team prepared for the task at hand. Just this past weekend the Zebras played Lesotho on an international friendly. Although we beat Lesotho 2-1 in that match, the focus was more on the technical staff preparing the team for the bigger picture; that of beating Uganda and subsequently Burkina Faso. We have another friendly lined up this weekend against Malawi here in Francistown. The match will be played on Sunday 29th May 2016 at 15h00. This should be our final test before the Uganda match. Although this is a friendly match we invite Batswana to come in numbers as they have always for matches in this City. Tickets for this friendly match; i.e. Botswana vs. Malawi go on sale today at P50.00 for the Grand Stand and P30.00 elsewhere, and are available at all the Spar outlets in the City and throughout the country. We note that in our earlier announcements we communicated the date of the Malawi friendly as 28th May 2016. This was to be part of a pre-planned event at the stadium. We have since agreed with the promoter of the event that the two events be separated; hence playing the match on Sunday 29th May 2016 to give way to the pre-planned Saturday event.

Our team started camp a week ago in Gaborone. The team arrived in Francistown on Saturday to continue with its preparations; having stopped over in Serowe on the same day for the friendly against Lesotho; where both teams were well received by the Serowe civic and traditional leadership as well as the people of Serowe. The team is camped here at the Adansonia Hotel, who continue to support us in all our projects in Francistown with our accommodation needs. We continue to look to the leadership, business community and the people of this beautiful City for the overwhelming support that we have come to be accustomed to in many areas of need. We have enjoyed this support in the past, and have attributed our team’s success in all the matches here to it. We urge all in Francistown to double their efforts to push their team closer to the AFCON qualifiers.

The Botswana vs. Uganda match is on Saturday 4th June 2016 at the Francistown Sports Complex. The match starts at 16h00. Tickets for the match are already on sale from the various OK Furnishers, Shoprite and Checkers outlets throughout the country

• Shoprite in Molepolole, Game City, Gaborone Station, Francistown, Maun and Gantsi
• Airport Junction Checkers in Gaborone
• House and Home at the Airport Junction
• U-Save Stores in Kang, Kanye and Mochudi
• OK Furnishers in Francistown, Gaborone Station, Broadhurst, Palapye, Serowe, Selebi Phikwe, Maun and Gantsi.

A mobile ticket office with three pay stations will be positioned in the car park opposite Hungry Lion to assist with store sales from Wednesday 1st June 2016. This should combat ticket traffic and keep queuing time to a minimum.

We continue to urge Batswana all over the country to buy tickets in time, and not to leave it until the last minute to avoid overcrowding at the ticket outlets and the inconvenience of missing out as tickets get sold out. This will be a Grade A match where we should not leave anything to chance. Tickets sell for P100 (Grand Stand), P50 (Eastern Stand) and P30 (behind the goalposts).

We continue to appreciate the support of the Francistown authorities, the LOC and the community at large in creating a letting environment for the Zebras to perform to their abilities. We also thank all the members of the corporate sector who continue to stretch their helping hand to us in our pursuits to take our team to the next level. Through our newly appointed Marketing and Communications agents, we continue to engage members of the corporate sector for them to play some form of role in the coming match. We have just engaged Botswana Railways to transport at least 600 supporters from the South who wish to come to the match. The full schedule for the train will be announced in due course, but would be such that it arrives in time for the match and departs within reasonable time after the match; taking issues of traffic into consideration.

Adansonia Hotel and Tati River Lodge have taken the lead in providing hospitality for the national team and BFA officials and functionaries. Their support continues to make it possible for us to adequately prepare the team and to ensure the successful hosting of all our matches in Francistown.

Proguard Security Services have come in as a security partner for the match

Emergency Assist on the other hand has come in as a paramedic services partner.

Sometime earlier this year, we announced a technical sponsorship agreement with Tsa Gae through their All Kasi brand. We have since been using their products partnership for all our national teams’ matches. We are happy to announce that for the Uganda match the Zebras will be playing on the new shirt. We will soon be making an announcement on the availability of the supporters’ replica shirts ahead of the Uganda match. • We continue to appeal for more participation of the corporate sector in all our activities; especially the all-important match against Uganda.

In conclusion, we wish to thank the Government of Botswana through the Botswana National Sports Commission (BNSC) for the continued support to our activities in the country; even during the toughest of the times. Our national teams’ activities continue to rely on Government for sustenance. Otherwise we would be faced with a situation where we have to withdraw from some of the official international competitions. We also wish to thank all Government departments who have played a role in our success to this point. It would be recalled that the BDF came to our rescue by way of providing the most comfortable and quickest passage of the team to the Comoros Islands and back earlier this year. For that we are very grateful. We also wish to thank the District Commissioner’s office in Francistown, the Francistown City Council, the Police, CTO and all the Government departments who have been helpful to our course in pursuit of our national assignments.

Last but not least, we wish to thank clubs who continue to make their players available for national duty even on challenging circumstances. We note that it is these clubs who look after the welfare of the national team players on an ongoing basis, but generously release these players whenever there is a call. We urge continue this good gesture.