Mashonaland dispute highlights major rifts remain

Zimbabwe's national team players have been barred from playing for the Mashonaland team in the country's only limited-overs first-class competition, the Faithwear One-Day tournament, that begins on Monday.

Cricinfo has been told that the disputed Mashonaland Cricket Assoction board, led by its controversial chairman Cyprian Mandenge, yesterday removed the names of players from the six top clubs in the province who were expelled from the provincial association last year. The six affected clubs are Harare Sports Club, Old Hararians, Alexandra, Takashinga, Universals, Old Georgians and Universals.

The provincial teams are picked by the panel of national selectors. But the new Zimbabwe head convener is Bruce Makovah, who was last week appointed by the new Zimbabwe Cricket interim. Makovah, who is also the Mashonaland head selector, previously said he will not pick players from the established clubs. The reason for this can be traced back to last October when Makovah and Mandenge led a pitch invasion at Harare Sports Club where they allegedly threatened players and racially insulted others.

The skeleton Mashonaland team to play against Matabeleland on Monday is made up of players from the development side, and is coached by Claudius Mukandiwa, who was also involved in the pitch invasion.

The other members if the selection committee are national team coach Kevin Curran, who is widely reported to be unpopular with many national players, and Kudzai Shoko, the general manager of the National Academy who is said to have close links to Peter Chingoka and Ozias Bvute.

By Sunday afternoon, most professional players did not know whether they would play, while a few had approached other provinces asking to be selected by them instead.