Thursday, March 28, 2024

Herve Renard slams CAF for not allowing Zambia to represent Africa in the Confed cup

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National Coach Renard at the training ground
National Coach Renard at the training ground

Zambia coach Herve Renard has criticised African football’s ruling body CAF for not allowing them the chance to represent the continent at this year’s Confederations Cup.

According to MTNfootball.com website, Zambia, having won the Africa Cup of Nations in 2012, would normally be flying the flag for Africa in Brazil, where the African flag-bearers will face world and European champions Spain, Uruguay and little Tahiti.

But due to CAF’s decision to switch the Nations Cup from even to odd-number years to avoid every second tournament clashing with a World Cup, it will be the winners of the 2013 Nations Cup, and not Zambia, who go to South America.

Renard, speaking out in the aftermath of his defending champions’ first round elimination Tuesday, felt Zambia should have been given the opportunity in a face-off against the team who will be crowned 2013 Nations Cup winners on February 10 in Soweto.

“CAF are very happy that Zambia are not going to the Confederations Cup, they think we are not sexy or famous enough to represent Africa — that’s the truth,” said the Frenchman.

He added: “It would be fairer if the winner between the 2012 Nations Cup champions and the 2013 winners went.

“But it never entered their thinking — CAF don’t want us to go. They made their decision, and it is the 2013 Cup winners who will represent Africa, not us.

“Unfortunately, we were only champions for one year.”

Zambia’s title defence ended prematurely when they suffered three successive first round stalemates to leave them stranded in third place in Group C behind Burkina Faso and Nigeria.

Despite becoming the first champions since Algeria in 1992 to fail to progress to the knockout stages, Renard praised his players.

“Everybody is sad but my players did their maximum, and I’m very proud of them.

“I loved my team tonight, I can’t play with eight defenders, if there is someone who is responsible then it’s me, not my players.

“It’s better to have won something in your life than always qualify for the quarter-finals, but never win anything.”

As for his own future as Zambia coach, Renard, who once had a brief spell at English lower-league side Cambridge United, intimated that he would still be in the post to supervise their qualifying campaign for the 2014 World Cup.

“Zambia’s not like other places in the world,” he said in a reference to the way some national coaches are asked to fall on their swords straight after a setback such as the one suffered by the fallen champions.

Zambia’s captain for the night, goalkeeper Kennedy Mweene, suggested the threadbare and sandy Mbombela Stadium pitch had played some part in Zambia’s downfall.

“The pitch contributed — we weren’t quite as efficient in front of goal. But I’m not disappointed, we were pressing them hard,” he said after the tense goalless stalemate.

ZANIS

68 COMMENTS

  1. You just did not shape a winning team. You adopted one which was in high spirits but under your full reign that team progressively went weak, with no scoring instincts. You cant cry the cry you are doing now if this team worn this current Africa Cup of Nations. Why cry about history when you cannot defend and hold on to the position one slot? Even if you went to Brazil today your team’s performance is not top slot. Stop crying over the spilt milk for its spilt, gone, no more, its history.

    • Floyd Chitalu (at 1), I totally agree with you.
      -It is a fact that the Zambian team that won the Africa Cup was groomed by Dario Bonetti. Zambians must remember that our Herve Renard left Angola not only because of dues but also because of a string of draws and losses the Angolan team suffered under our Hero.
      -It is also a fact that it is Bonetti who qualified the Zambian team to 2012 CAF. By the time Herve came the team was already prepared for the big battle and they eventually went ahead and won the cup.
      -It is also a fact that since Herve came the Zambian team’s performance has been spiraling into abyss. When Bonetti got fired Kalusha was quick to condemn him and said that Bonetti didn’t have the capacity to take the team to the next level. Question: Has Herve gone to next…

    • Chitalu tell this fake french coach the friend to kalu to shut up, he failed in Angola to perfom for Angola national team when he came back here in Zambia he found the team was sharped up by Mr. Bornnet & that was the team which won Afcon last year, in fact he is luck he is protected by this selffish guy so called kalu .

    • No we would be embarrassed at the Confed Cup because we would lose all our games. Its better to stay in Lusaka and try and plot a way of beating Lesotho in the World Cup

    • Its not about crying over spilt milk BUT Zambia has been robbed a chance to play the confederations cup.The change of calender should not affect the Zambian team as its a new implementation!Wake up!

    • Why are we crying like children now? Was the switch made last night? When did this division three French league coach know about the CAF switch? Last night?
      We all know that defeat is a heavy and lonely burden to bear and the division three French coach has to bear it alone!
      We are not naive or oblivious to his substandard coaching that he has to create this insinuation about CAF to divert our attention. He took over a team that was strong and won us the cup, but in less than one year, he has weakened it and totally destroyed what he found instead of adding value.
      Its like what binani did to Luanshya mines or Railway Services of Zambia (RSZ) did to Zambia railways
      We just have to be bold & blunt and tell him to pack & go!!

    • Why do you heap all the blame on the coach and not the administrators? You had Bonnetti, and all you did everyday was to castigate him for being an absentee coach but today he is your un sung hero. How about your most prolific striker of all time, the great Kalu, what has he got to show for the time he was the national team coach? I totatly agree with HR on the play off, however since the switch was announced a year ago, FAZ should have made this representation then, not now when the team has under performed. Please bear in mind that you can have Murinho, Pep or Sir Ferguson as the coach but if your administration does not inspire the players, the result will not be different from what you just had. Anyone remember Mr. G. Mungwa? Without much football in him but was an excellent coach.

    • Zambia did their best and i cant put any blame on the coach or players alot of factors came into play such as the pitch,climate and just the nature of the game, now u stuupid critics stop the insults and negatives these guys did us proud and brought the cup before so lets focus on the world cup and make it for the first ever time viva renard and kalu with copper bulletts

  2. The coach is right. The boys played well but like any sport,you can not win all the time.Lets accept it and begin to look forward. For me CHIPOLOPOLO is mine win or loose!!!!

  3. While you and CAF are having your slug-fest, how’s about we slam you for three convincingly lackluster performances?

  4. this is a passing phase let u look forward and see what we can do, blames will never work. the game starts now! go go chipolopolo for 2014!

    • Agreed. They had no drive. It’s like they were satisfied with the last win (when they became champions ) and did not seem to put in much except towards the dying minutes when they kind of woke up from their slumber. But it was already too late. I dont know why the captain was not featured !!!!

  5. Champions for 11 Months, a world record I have been sent a joke on my mobile phone and rightly so.

    You deserve what you get, I hate football

    These are the times when in all honest, I lie about being Zambian, we are an embarrassment being words

    At least I am more educated than any football player to ever play this rubbish game. Even at Netball we were never embarrassed like this during my school days

    Hate when people think they are better than they really are

    Thanks

    • Going by your name there is clearly something in short supply in your head.Please spare us your lunacy and concentrate on whatever you are studying.For somebody who is doing her PHd you could really do something constructive with your time e.g contributing development related articles to LT for the benefit of everyone than silly comments like these.I respect other peoples’ opinions but yours are questonable and a reflection of your level of thinking.PHd my a***.

    • Mushota darling….pleeeease don’t deny your roots.
      But if you can insist, I guess a good-looking girl like you can come over to Naija where we can show you what real BALLING is all about.
      Quality always shines through in the end. Dubious penalties don’t count. We can ‘penalise’ you, but in a positive way.
      Don’t mind these bitter men here. They have lost their mojo to Burkina Faso and Naija.
      Give me a call?
      SEQZ-E! (Super Eagles Qualified, Zambia – Eliminated!)

    • Iwe mfana, I agree with your first sentence. It is a joke that African Football can make such stu.pid decisions when European or other bodies would care less about what came into conflict with who knows what.

      You have obviously lost me in the rest of what you say.

      If I were a Bemba like you black African trying to leave your dark skin, I would not make any comment on football, since as you say, you do not like football. Find somewhere where people are discussing netball or a game of CONKERS, since you worship things white.

    • You must be so stupid. If u don’t wanna be Zambian go to kwanzhong in China. This kind of thinking does not befit you. It is a type found only among kaponyas at Soweto market.

  6. Retire some players, especially old ones including Christopher Katongo, Felix Katongo, Chamanga, Joseph Musonda and probably Nkausu etc. We also need to look for more strikers and only take players on their current form and not their names.

    We need new strikers and urgently so that we can work on qualifying for the world cup. We played well and could have won even by a lone goal if we had clinical finishers. I still have room for Mbesuma, Mayuka, Jacob, Mukuka, Kalaba, Sinkala, Chisamba, etc and of course our defence pillars in Sunzu, HH, Mbola etc!!!

    Unless we retire and recruit new players, we can forget about restoring our soccer glory!!!

  7. HR dont listen to good for nothing lunatic soccer talkers. You are the most well suited coach far much better than clueless epl coaches zambians watch every week. Why anyone would fault or call you names defies logic. Wished we had gone to confederations cup,the world would ve seen we are only beaten but not defaeted.

  8. Careful mushota you just shot yourself in the foot, some have been to universities e.g “Brasileiro Sampaio De Souza Viera De Oliveira” he was a doctor in medicine and also holds a doctorate degree in philosophy.

  9. i thought mushota is wise,but i ve seen she s unwise.what has her education got to do with football.my dear no matter what u do and say zambia will remain your country.its not gud my dear change your attitude

    • I actually thought he was the first coach to take us beyond the first round in Angola (after a long time) where Nigeria beat us but all knew that we were the better side. The next competition, we won the cup. So how is the guy a failure?

  10. A good leader is one who takes responsibility for his mistakes and Herve Renard has just proved that, because he is coach it is required of him to assume responsibility even though it is not entirely his fault. Players, especially the strikers, should also owner up to their fault and failure to execute the duties entrusted in them by the Zambian citizens.

    My advice to all who like blaming after something goes bad and keep quiet when something is not going well, my advice for is to start suggesting solutions or just shut up. sometimes you lose and sometimes you win.

    Herve Renard should continue as coach 100% in support of him. what the team needs are strikers and also to improve on the coordination of passes.
    Herve Renard should work on grooming strikers, that is what is…

  11. Bring dual nationality and than search for players all over the world,,their charles renken who is believed to be a rising star in us league,,the kid left zam only 10 yrs ago and was adopted by amercian parents,,similarly their are many more players out their ie,,robert earnshaw who was goal poacher in his days and decided to play for wales,his step fathers nationality,,faz wake up and lobby the government to allow players with dual pp,,

    • positive contribution but directed to wrong people.
      can’t you see that kalusha is a jealous person when it comes to success.
      he hates successful and independent minded people (players). look at the way he has ignored charles musonda’s children… one of them is even playing for the belgium national team.
      this kalusha has in a way contributed in the lacklustre performance of our national team
      he may have been a great player, but definetly he is not a good administrator.

  12. I love our national team so much,they did their best,since we are winning world cup next year! Its fine let the others have the cup. Zambia had put a smile on my face last year upto now am still happy.Rena u ar great.

  13. WERE IS THE FAZ PRESIDENT when such matters come up. Kalusha is really sleeping?? To be fair Zambia should represent AFRICA. Or let the two teams meet and winners to go. CAF always favor West African teams because of the old Cameroonian CAF president time the position got held by a southern African.

  14. CAF are West africans, rena forget about that idea those guys are happy we are out, look at the pitch they gave us terrible.
    But don’t ever use wasteful C.Katonga and useless J. mulenga. iam happy neither played yesterday and i am happy on the way we played without them. it was jst a difficult game and were under pressure. chris and jacob costed on the ethopian game.

    kennedy mweene and nsunzu you are my men

  15. Bloggers, the Mushota masquerade today is not the real one. That is not the way she writes. Besides, there is always a lady in hat on all Mushota’s postings. The one today is an imposter who thinks can cheat people. Wanya amafi kolwe iwe, you are not Mushota.

    • Mushota at #7 thinks anything Zambian is bad, people who are well educated do not boast about their qualifications, because they are theirs to keep not forged.

  16. Penangu the coach akanachinjako kaja kashati kake kawhite mwe..? Everybody studied the zambian team inside out and it was easy to play against because there were few changes.A new zambian team should have new players…

  17. Come on Herve Renard get real! It is not about being sexy or famous,,,it is about playing soccer. Thank CAF for saving Chipolopolo the embarrasment! Zambian failed to beat 10-man Ethopia, do you really want them to face Spain and Brazil?
    Since winning AFCON12 Zambia has played 7 competitive games. In those games they have only scored 3 goals from open play,,,Champions really?
    Dario Bonnetti assembled a team for you,,,and it lifted the AFCON12 cup. You had the team after that,,,and guess what the team you assembled failed to win a single game at AFCON13!

  18. HR be realistic with yourself…your team is simply not good enough in fact you should thank CAF for saving us from the embarrassment; we failed to win a single match at the AFCON and we are the defending champions out in the group stage. The selfsame way we played in friendlies is the same way we played at the final…awful!!
    I bet if we went to the Confederations Cup your CV would have been very colourful…

    • Hv Renard, you failed miserably at CAF. To the Zambians you must abhour failure if the nation has to progress. I expect HR and FAZ to be ashamed instead of glorying failure. FAZ fire HR

  19. Can someone suggest what we could ( as zambians) do with CAF please? Can we cite all their short comings and impeach them if possible? am ready for any move.
    Thankx

  20. watching last nite’s match was like attending a funeral procession. I had to tell myself this was only a game, otherwise I would have probably suffered a cardiac arrest, and am sure I wasnt the only one. It is such a shame that things happened this way. But i take comfort from the prophetic comment by one of the sports journalists on the eve of the match: that either nigeria or zambia would fail to qualify. Bottom line is our strikers failed to deliver when it mattered most. Infact the match was lost long before the the afcon matches kicked off, soon after our win in 2012. To pick up the pieces, we have to go back to the drawing board and the search for winning strategies must be implemented immediately. There was no creativity in taking free kicks or corners.

    • Thank my stars I didn’t watch it. I was driving from Namibia to S Africa and entered the host country only to be met by Pole headlines saying “Chipolopolo fire blanks”

  21. For the first time I concure with CAF. Sending our current team that has no hunger for goals to the Confed Cup tournament would result in a very poor showing of African soccer. Unlike in 2012 when we had a team that would go to tournaments to WIN, this time we have one that goes to tournaments NOT TO LOSE. These are interesting guys: tabla kwati ulubuli – they don’t beat anyone and no one beats them!! And then they just leave on their own… Hahaha YABA!!

  22. In all fairness Zambia should have represented Afrika in Brazil, but I wonder why the debate haz only surfaced now, when the decision waz made a long time ago.

  23. I’m delighted that Zambia stumbled; they were never good enough even when they won last year. They’d be the champs for the shortest time in the history of CAF. They embarrassed themselves for not winning a single game especially failing to beat the lowest ranked team in the tournament. The lowest ranked team player with one man less than Zambia yet Zambia couldn’t crack up a game winning strategy. Whack champion-next time let your government invest in something worthy of future returns.

    Never brag about a team as shallow as Zambia’s. That team is a total failure

  24. I cannot believe this. Would they (CAF )have changed the rules if the trophy was in. west Africa? we have been cheated. its not right AT ALL!!!!

    • Which rules are you referring to?
      Are you aware why things have been changed this year at all? You think it is because of ‘West Africans’? You have no idea how divided ‘west Africa’ is along national borders. Nigerians would much prefer Zambia to win the AFCON than Ghana for example.
      Well…maybe not. The Champions’ quality last year was a little embarrassing. Hahaha!

  25. Zambians learn to appreciate.God’s time is the best we cant force mataz if it waz ment for us,we wuld have done it like we did it last year dont blame anyone for the los.

  26. Let us all campaign for dual nationality so that the 3 talented boys of cool charlie are able to play for chipolopolos,,if no dual nationality does anyone in their right mind give up belgium nationality,,charlie wass and is smart guy,,no ways can he allow his kids to relenquish belgium nationality,,,so DUAL NATIONALITY IS WAY FORWARD,,,

  27. i think kalu is the problem for not listening to the views of some soccer fans,i see no reason for someone who appologies for the wrong doing,and still the coach insist that hecan not call back the player coz he can destroy the moral in the team i mean clifford.so let kalu and renard have that mind aya kumfwa kubantu not ukuichitila ify mumintwe mu mwabo.

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