By GRACE CHAILE –
GLASGOW 2014 Commonwealth Games bronze medallist Boas Munyonga is among the five judokas that have been picked to represent Zambia at the World Championships in Chelyabinsk, Russia.
Munyonga will compete in the -81kg event at the championships that will run from August 25 to 31 together with Mathews Punza (-66kg) and Abigail Chindele (-48kg), the two who also took part in the Commonwealth Games.
Zambia Judo Association (ZJA) technical director Francis Linosi has also roped in Joshua Nyonodo (-60kg) and David Chisenga (-66kg).
Linosi said in an interview that the team that began training in February entered residential camp yesterday at Lusaka’s National Sports Development Centre (NASDEC) for fine tuning.
He said judokas have been training very hard bearing in mind that the championship acts as a qualifier for the Rio 2016 Olympics Games to be held in Brazil.
“The team is technically prepared for the event. All the judokas began training in February and have already participated in competitive championships. We have seasoned judokas in this team capable of reaping a medal,” he said.
Linosi said the onus was now on the judokas to gain more points at the championship to enable them qualify for the Olympics.
He said he was targeting at-least having more than three judokas at the Olympic Games because that gives the nation an advantage of reaping more medals.
