The Chevrons just completed a short 3 match One day international tour of Sri Lanka and it looks like that’ll be it for quite some time on the international stage. How long can be considered long enough after a tour should a full ICC member be inactive? We barely play anyone besides Bangladesh and Pakistan

Sri Lanka will tour Australia in two weeks time and then India

In a few weeks time South Africa will be facing New Zealand, New Zealand will then face Australia after South Africa and South Africa have Bangladesh then England then India.

Pakistan have a very good T20 tournament to make sure their squad is always strong and also have a visit from the Aussies,

India is fully stocked before the T20 world cup, they face the Windies , then Sri Lanka , then South Africa, then England all in the short format.

Bangladesh face South Africa before October

Zimbabwe on the other have nothing on the calender (maybe not yet). Every other country has more than enough cricket to keep their players active on the international stage and that will obviously only make them better.

Zimbabwe on the other hand can play all the domestic cricket they can but it’s simply not enough and as a result the team looks like a shadow of a test playing nation. The talent is there but the practice is nowhere near close enough to being standard. Zim cricket barely makes it to any world cup these days. The Under 19 are the only team that represents the country in a world cup the senior team last played in a world cup in 2015. That’s a damning record considering we just entered 2022 and the likes of Namibia and Papua New Guinea played last year and we didn’t (no disrespect intended to Namibia cricket and Papua New Guinea cricket).

We last played England in a tour in 2003.

In 2018 Australia played the Chevrons in a T20 tour in Harare and completely decimated the Zimbabweans reflecting the difference in quality between the sides. For a team that is part of the test playing nations, the difference between them and the next team on the list is just too big and it all comes down to a lack of game time. These days we only ever expect to win anything against Bangladesh and even the Bangladeshis are now a class above the Chevrons, truth be told. If we could play more regularly, we could have a better chance of pausing a threat to nations that are at our level.

In conclusion maybe we don’t have to start by playing the big guns, which we must eventually but at least get the boys on a plane to Scotland and the Netherlands every now and then. Maybe make a habit of playing SA and Namibia to keep the boys ticking on the international stage. Sounds easy on paper but I hope the cricket governing body in Zimbabwe is doing everything in its power to make sure the boys are well equipped to at least compete..

What do you think can be done or should be done to get the team playing better and performing at a higher level.