The national basketball team plans to play two build-up games as part of preparations for the 2021 African Basketball Championships (Afrobasket) qualifiers.

The qualifiers is scheduled for November 25-29 in Kigali. It will be a three-group (A, B and D) tournament.

In an interview on Monday, Desire Mugwiza, president of the Rwanda basketball federation (Ferwaba), told Times Sport that the local basketball body has formally written to their counterparts of the Central African Republic (CAR), the DR Congo and Kenya requesting for friendly games.

"We want at least two friendly games to help our team before the qualifiers. We wrote to three countries, hopefully two or all of them will respond positively,” said Mugwiza.

CAR and DR Congo are part of Group A, while Kenya is in Group B.

If approved, the games would take place on November 22-23.

Meanwhile, America-born Rwanda international Kenneth Gasana joined the team’s camp at Onomo Hotel on Sunday night, while Sweden-based Dylan Schommer Kalecyezi is expected in the country on November 22.

Rwanda begin her Group D campaign against Mali on November 26 before facing Nigeria on the 28th and Algeria the following day.

However, Rwanda will only use the qualifiers as early preps for the Afrobasket 2021 finals tournament because the country has an automatic ticket as the host nation.