Zimbabwe Women's U20 head coach Garthly Chipuka has fired a warning to his Rwandan rivals that his side will leave Kigali with a ticket to the next round of the U20 FIFA World Cup 2026 qualifiers. Zimbabwe host Rwanda in the second leg of the qualifiers first round on Wednesday, May 14, at Kigali Pele Stadium. The same ground hosted the first leg which ended 2-1 in favor of Rwanda on Sunday, May 11. However, Chipuka said that his charges have what it takes to turn the result around, eliminate Rwanda and qualify for the next round. Qualification will be based on aggregate so we will try to beat Rwanda handsomely to overturn the 2-1 deficit and make it to the next stage,” Chipuka said. He admitted that his team lost the first leg due to poor preparation but he believes the last two days were enough for him to know how Rwanda play, hence the team hopes to capitalize on their deficiencies. ALSO READ: U20: Gisubizo nets winner as Rwanda beat Zimbabwe in World Cup qualifier We are down 2-1 from the first leg this is because we were not prepared mentally for the first leg. Both goals were from avoidable mistakes as we virtually gifted them to Rwanda. We are going to work on our mistakes now that we know how they play. We are going to prepare much better for Wednesday’s match, he added. After four qualifying rounds, top four teams out of the 38 which started the qualifying campaign will represent Africa in the 12th edition of the U20 Women's World Cup in Poland from September 5-27, 2026. Cameroon, Ghana, Morocco and Nigeria represented Africa in the last edition in Colombia in 2024. Nigeria and Cameroon made it to the round of 16.
