Friday, March 29, 2024

It’s Our Fault Says Renard

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Isaac Chansa with an opportunity to score that went begging
Isaac Chansa with an opportunity to score that went begging

Herve Renard puts on a brave face after Zambia’s embarrassing exit from the 2013 Africa Cup on January 29 at Mbombela Stadium in Nelspruit earned them the tag of outgoing champions.

A 0-0 draw against Burkina Faso on Tuesday night was enough to boot the 2012 champions out of this year’s Africa Cup and end a 20-year record previously held by Algeria who exited the 1992 tournament with one point at the preliminary round.

“We had three draws and it was not enough to qualify. It is our fault,” Renard said.

Renard lamented that their biggest mistake was failing to beat a 10-man Ethiopia who outplayed them and rally to force a 1-1 draw in their opening Group c match on January 21.

“We have gone nine games at the Africa without losing which is a good record but it is not enough since we are not reaching the quarterfinals,” Renard said.

Meanwhile, Renard also justified his reasons for the historic benching of his faithful captain Christopher Katongo from the game after the player had come under heavy attack following his uninspiring display in Zambia’s last two Group C games.

“This football and in football there is competition,” Renard said.

“We don’t only have one striker in or squad. You need to be efficient.”

Zambia finished third in Group C on three points, two behind leaders Burkina Faso and Nigeria who advanced to the February 3 quarterfinals in first and second place.

122 COMMENTS

  1. Mayuka looked finished.in my opinion it’s renard’s fault that made us come home this early.kalu elanyafye amasushi.we need serious preps for world cup qualifiers.

    • It is not the coach to blame you dumb people. The chaps cannot score that is the problem period. You can have the best coach you want, with strikers like Mbesuma. Do you think you can win? In two different games he did the same thing. In the penalty area, kicked the ball in the palms of the goal keeper. Now you are blaming the coach. Use your brains and stop blaming the coach. What can the coach do? Zambia has no strikers and that is the problem period. The fact that they draw all three games shows that the team is not bad it is just the striking force missing. You don’t score you don’t win period. Find strikers with fresh blood. If we had good strikers we would have beaten Nigeria, Ethiopia and Burkina Faso. In all the games we played we had better chances of scoring than our opponents.

    • Herve’s faulty? Be serious. Although its history, don’t forget the same coach won us the first AFCON cup ever! We should be brave to blame players at times. No striking force and desire through and through.

    • Let’s admit that our standard of play has really deteriorated after winning AFCON 2012. You can look back at our performances against Sudan, Uganda, Tanzania and Angola before this tournament kicked off – the writing was always on the wall. Even when we beat Bafana 1-0 in Joburg we featured almost a new team in each half whereas SA made less than 5 changes. I actually pity Uganda whom we literally robbed of the opportunity to play in SA, maybe they’d have put up a better performance. The most painful thing is that our boys are very skillful, but the technical bench Is not not tactical and there’s no die hard spirit in the team. What a way to exist a tournament – no one beat us, in other words we beat ourselves out of it!

    • Iwe the Genius we blame the coach for not having strikers who can score. This chap had the whole year to look for one but depended on the team that Bonneti assembled.No bonus bane….fire Renard, he has failed us. Dont blame any of the strikers besides even midfielders or defenders can score.

    • JINKO WHICH STRIKERS DO U WANT HIM TO FIND WHEN THE COUNTRY DOESNT HAVE? TELL ME WHICH STRIKER WHO IS A CITIZEN OF ZAMBIA THAT HAS SCORED MORE THAN 18 GOALS IN A SEASON OVER THE PAST THREE YEARS???

    • @KAYA, you now know why Mayuka is always warming the bench at Southampton and why Mbesuma was doing the same at Norwich. The truth is Zambia does not have lethal and intelligent strikers. I do not know if this has something to do with the level of education of Zambian players.

    • WELL,WELL! when Zambia lifted the cup,PF boasted that it is only under their administration that Zambia can achieve success.They forgot that at that time they were only THREE MONTHS in government which meant that 95% input was done by the former administration which they did not want to acknowledge.What does PF say now?

    • Dont insult them remember these are the same boys that made us smile in a very long time. The boys that wiped our tears away after losing that great team in a plane crash. In football there are mistakes and u learn from them and pick yoseves up and continue living.

    • @The Genius It is the coach’s duty to assemble a winning team, period. That is what he is paid for. @Pablo Escobar The team that won the cup had input of two coaches. Herve Renard inherited the team from Dario Bonnetti. Now he had a year to put his stamp on it.

    • I agree. We blame the coach. He had so much material on the bench that he could have used. Kalaba was not in the game right from the beginning of the ton ament but he was kept in the team

  2. @Kaya, Mayuka was great. Herve too was simply best decision maker on who starts the match.
    Blame PF, PF, PF has messed moods of all Zambians.
    And who the hell bought that Jersey? You can’t simply play well when you look inferior.

    • This is just laughable..
      You even have the audacity to blame PF for the substandard, dismal, appalling, fragmented and crappy play that our team has put out shortly after winning the AFCON cup to date.
      One thing we are so consistent of is, inconsistence. Let us find a better coach now to take over from this division three French league coach.
      For those blaming PF, I will simply say, you are welcome. you can also blame PF for the following as well:
      Blame PF for your failure to satisfy your wife mukavala ma door ku bedroom.
      Blame PF even for your failure to have children due to your low sperm count
      As for the moolar promised to the underperformers, lets plough it into hospitals & education

    • Do you think the result would have been the same if people and their leaders had a mind focussed on attaining goals? Object Oriented population, lets work, we still have the world cup.

    • This soccer stuff is just a waste of money.It was morally wrong for GRZ to promise those chaps $11,000 just for kicking an inflated leather sack into a net within 90 minutes when we don’t have Oxygen and Blood at UTH.In a way God wants us to check our priorities seriously.

  3. Sad we are out. The other thing is that the pitches we played on were not condusive for the type of game we play. Against Nigeria we resorted to long balls in the second half which cost us the game. Correction, Ethiopia did not out play us, we did. We should note that its more difficult to beat 10 men than 11 because generally they (10 men) resort to defending and crowding their defence. We just did not score more and lapsed in conceding that goal. Compared to 2012 the team was not camped for a long time. Back to the drawing board and focus on the world cup. Mukuka Mulenga is very promising. Kalaba is excellent and so is Chisamba but they need more effort especially the former. Please Chisamba is an attacking midfielder and not defender as his performance has clearly shown. Wake up call.

    • Iwe Tuse! Your excuses for Zambia’s insipid performance are laughable. If what you say is true, why did Burkina Fasso put 4 past them when they were down to 10 men? Why did Nigeria stroll to an easy victory? Find a better excuse, that one won’t wash!

    • Gooner, Burkina Faso were reduced to 10 and so Ethopia was trying to get the goal hence them (Ethopia) being caught on the break. Thats why they conceded 4 goals. Nigeria got a penalty as a result of foul play which resulted in a penalty. Nigeria scored from that which meant Ethopia had no point in defending but attack which is the same thing they did after Zambia scored against them. Besides Nigeria scored with 10 min remaining.

    • @ Mwilungu…Really!!?…
      You should have read your coach’s car (corolla-Benz) metaphor. My interpretation, he was basically telling us that we must accept his substandard coaching and live with it.

  4. The pitch we played on was bad compared to the pitch nigeria played on. Am not sayin thts why we havn’t qualified but it doesnt support the kind of football we play. We are still in the fight for the world cup spot

    • For me the pitch was pathetic,atleast if we were given the other pitch for the last game. Killer passes could not reach the players accurately.

    • Ba NEC what about the pitches we ahve here in Zambia where most of our players started playing football from whats the condition????………..

    • What will you do when you qualify to the world cup with such a team and a coach? Please lets be real and shift our focus on more productive ventures now, like ensuring there is oxygen in our hospitals. This might appear less important, but you never know when you will be a victim one day and need such facilities. I guess you and me won’t be flown to South Africa for treatment like the few privileged politicians.

  5. Is this the team you would like to take to Brazil or and a different one? Actually, we need to be honesty as to why we lost. The preparation we had was well planned but we did get anything and we under achieved. So to me, i saw this one coming. I was against Mayuka moving to England. Warming up the bench, now he has become ikula, Chris Katongo…how old is and will he be ready for Brazil or done? Coach, i think you will need 6 new faces and give Mukuka Mulenga more time now that you have seen him on inter-nation level.

  6. We can return to the drawing board with lessons learnt. We were never beaten even though we are out.

    World cup, here we come.

  7. BWANA RENARLD, THE WRITING WAS ALWAYS ON THE ‘WAR’ WITH OTHER TEAMS IN THE GROUP IF NOT ALL THE GROUPS!
    WHICH OTHER TEAM PLAYED MAPLES WITH ROOKIES ETHIOPIA-LET ALONE 10 MAN ETHIOPIA?

    HOW DO YOU GO INTO A DECIDING WAR WITHOUT A DECORATED GENERAL, FOR A SOURCE OF INSPIRATION!-NEVER MIND KATONGO’S FRAILTY, I AM SURE HE SHOULD HAVE RISEN TO THE OCCASION WHEN IT MATTERED MOST?

  8. The team was just useless performance in all the three games,very rubbish.Katongo,mbesuma etc very useless strikers,im sure zambia has better strikers than that.

    • IMWE PLS mbesuma scored in the first game , the game was taffu and we were under serious pressure we must have played the combination at first and make gradual changes as the tournament progressed we have good players the problem is how to came up with the good combination.

  9. renard’s failure to make meaningful changes in the second half after a lucklustre first half cost us the game. Am i the only one who follows Man United through every win and every loss? Sir Alex always induces change in the squad by making tactical changes to the shape and form of the team when needed throughout the second half. Herve just sat there through the second half ,looking cool in his ka white shirt, while our quarter final date flipped through our fingers. Sakuwaha was brought in too late, and instead of bring the big forwards in and going for broke when we had atleast three corners and two spot kicks is deplorable. what annoys me further is SAFA ‘s failure to provide a decent pitch that would have allowed zambia to play its natural game. we are not a big team we rely on

  10. our passing game and pace to make inroads. I very much doubt the outcome of our three matches would have been the same had we had a decent playing surface. The other teams prevailed against the playing field and thats a fact. im just saying our chances were diminished. My summation is pitch conditions, coach’s tactical error and a lack of desire and sharpness by our strikers led to our demise. But through win or loss im still proud of our team. its the best team i remember in recent years and there is room to develop further. Lets focus on the world cup now.

    • Yesterday the jury was out against Katongo – Katongo out, you all typed. Now you we get booted out you start looking for Katongo. You asked for Katongo to be benched and the coach did just that. Move on. I am now supporting the Super Eagles, hoping they can get beat Ivory Coast. Super Eagles goooooooooooo. If Super Eagles gets booted out I will look for another anglophone country to support. Bafana Bafana and Ghana.

    • you people learn to appreciate and accept come what may. how could you have expected us to win and the players go away with colossal sums of money, when people are dying in so called highest health institution (UTH) due to lack of oxygen facility, and the government dont want to admit that when the reports are seen. what they say is people die everyday at UTH, Do you think God is happy with that? look above to him before you comment

  11. We basically went back to this AFCON with the same team that won it. This was wrong and in my opinion we should have brought in new blood to make the team more efficient and to avoid fatigue. One of the two new people, Mukuka, made an impact. At least 5 new people should have come in. We have perenial people on the bench that never see action nut always on the team.
    The problem of goals was there, even in the last AFCON, but we did nothing to end it. My advice is that the team should be purged of players that are not contributing to the success, even the coach if possible. I do not see a reaso why eight new players can be brought in that are hungry for success. Ghana came with ten!!
    (Contd in next post)

  12. At the moment the players that I think we still need for the future, in my humble opinion are: Mweene, HH, Sunzu, Joseph Musonda, Chisamba Lungu, Isaac Chansa, Mayuka, Mbesuma, Sakuwaha, Mukuka Mulenga. This leaves about ten positions available where Chris Katongo and others can compete to fill.
    We still have the World Cup around the corner and I say we start immediately to prepare for it with the right people, even if it means changing coaches. Nobody should be in the team if they are not contributing. Even the coach

  13. Renard,

    It was a grave mistake to bench the Captain for several reasons and one of them? Sending a wrong signal to the entire team that your own choice of their leader is questionable in quality and form.

    Whether you like it or not, Katongo has scored 19 times in the last 80 of our appearances, that’s a 23.75% he would likely score whenever he plays and you simply decide to put on the bench?

    I am boycotting Air France for a my next trip to Europe, in fact do you see the avatar with my picture, it was taken soon after having dinner at restaurant in Milan, Italy on arrival from Paris, France.

    No more passing through the City of Romance (Paris) until I start feeling good your coaching decisions today. The boys needed positive reinforcement no matter where it came from.

    • Now if you help the lads to qualify to the World Cup, I might just reconsider my decision about Air France and my boycott for the City of Romance (love).

    • Mwakalipa ba Mumba. It is good to know from the USA, you are you are up to date with what is going on at AFCON. It was wonderful meting with you in Nashville Tennessee last June- July 2012.

    • Ba Reverend: Endita mukwai … the pleasure was mine as well. Great to hear from you, I always keep myself informed with what is going on within our fantastic franchise called the Zambian Enterprise. Eko twashike imitoto shesu ku Zambia Ba Shimapepo mukalamba.

      Kalebalika mukwai mwe ntamba lukuta.

  14. No worry we are going to the World Cup. Ethiopia game Killed us..too causal wrong subs, Don,t ever play names ba Coach. u put out a good team 2day, too bad we were playing against 12 men. need to improve in front of goal.. other wise good effort 2day.

    • dont raise your hopes about the world cup, there are at least 5 better teams on the continent to grab these places. you’ve NEVER played at that level before!! in the unlikely event that zambia qualify then it would probably be down to fluking it like you did the AFCON is 2012 🙂

  15. Zambia was not the Zambia we know and used to at this AFCON. There was no sense of commitment, cohesion, team spirit and above all a sense of purpose in the team. From the first game against Ethopia, it was evidently clear that the team was there to simply fulfill its fixture. This is the first tournament in a very longtime that Zambia did not leave people asking for more but instead we left as a laughing stock. I can smell rat here! I do not not trust the selfish Administration of Kalu. Just ask those who played with him, Gibby, Charlie cool, Stone Nyirenda and one unit commando Johnstone Bwalya, they will tell you. Remember the Mayuka saga? The team could have played the wrong players at his instigation because honestly, the players seemed very disoriented in the manner they played.

    • Man i think u are right KALUSHA BWALYA needs to resign in the interest of the ZAMBIAN FOOTBALL lovers .then the other thing we need to do is to look for assistant experience coach to train our boys the striking strategy . we were the most feared team so far at afcon this year .

    • please not again the blame game. why do want to thnk we are holier than others and find faulty to justify a failure. lets face it we were not just good enough this time. peolple who rush to find faults in others are most of the time failures themselves.

  16. Lack of scoring goals by our strikers explains why Mayuka hits the bench all the times at Southampton. Our strikers lacks sense of agency to score goals besides they fail to shoot from out side the box. Look at Mbesuma shooting 2 weak shoots just on the mouth of a goal post into palms of goalkeepers in 2 games, that is not acceptable in any team. We serious need good strikers

  17. When we drew with South Korea the Couch said goals are reserved for the tournament.Where are the goals you promised?
    Why promising such money in the middle of the tournament? To me if it meant such money it would have been known before the tournament.

    It is a lesson to Kambwili as well as h e proved to be one who does not apprciate what others contributed to the national team.

    When we won the cup last year no one mentioned the success of RB and his MMD administration which did a lot of preparations for the team to get the cup.All we heard is PF at work.
    Its shame to Kambwili that all the preparations we either drew or lost.
    Faded jessey,faded money,faded cup .
    Can we sing dont kubeba again?

  18. @6 bongani, you at it again, leave the coach to do his job professionally, stop giving unprofessional advice which has costed zambia this africa cup. Coach renard why did you bench katongo ist coz bongani, muvi tv and other fake soccer analysts that resurrect during africa cup, said so.too many fake soccer analysts some of their comments are bizarre.

    • That’s right.He gave bad mashamo to the players.Because you could see that we were being punished by his bad minyama.MCS alishaminka abaice bazambia.

  19. Zambia seem to be playing stage football. the boys are so good in all areas except scoring. Our strikers played like they were on trials. So far there are no play makers at afcon and the boys should have taken advantage of that . Going back to when they won the afcon last year, they played mostly as a team and most of the goals scored were team efforts involving two or more players. We may blame the coach but he might have told them what to do and score then they tried like mbesuma nicely putting the ball into the hands of the goal keeper. I like kalaba. He was in control of the mid field most of the time. He reminds me of the late Alex chola. Seriously we need to find merciless strikers who should be attempting to score even from very far. awe chabipa bane.

  20. Gentlemen we need to find a striker who can use both legs. This costed us as Mbesuma failed to score two clear goals in two separate games because of the same deficiency. However, the guys were good and we played well and we should move on

  21. Bane it hurts to get kicked out this early, But remember in 2012; we went in as underdogs. In 2013, we were not looked at as underdogs but reigning AFCON champions therefore the pressure was on us …. Get on.

  22. Ala mwe bakala calo natu tekanye. We should not start pointing fingures at this time. We need to go back and reflect what we need to do in order to qualify to the World Cup. Renard has done a very good job for Zambia. What the team needs now is our support. We should not only support the team when it is winning. Our team needs our support more than ever before. Renard will take Zambia to the World Cup and we will show the whole world what a GREAT footballing nation Zambia is!

  23. Its football you win ,draw or lose. the earlier we accept it the better beause we have the world cup qualifiers to look up to. besides lets avoid thiniking by winning the cup lats year we were the best team even now No. we missed our chances against Ethiopia and we have paid for it. at leat we are in history of having the shortest reign as african champs. lets go to the world cup now. Reality!

  24. It is sad we are out though we did our best . The coach should have read the game spot on and made tactical changes quickly. Christopher Katongo should have come on knowing his abilities and strength against strong defences. He is a guy who exerts a lot of pressure under such circumstances. Anyway lets maintain the same team and coach for the world cup. They are good lads and only need to be highly focussed in such big tournaments.

  25. Let us ban competitive football in Zambia until IAM satisfied we can play at international level. Wasting TAX payers money shaaaa. Ifimitwe.

  26. AFCON IS BEHIND US.WE STILL HAVE LESOTHO AWAYAND HOME,SUDAN HOME THEN GHANA AWAY AS OUR FINAL WORLD CUP QUALIFYING MATCHE.BESIDES, WE STILL HAVE CHAN AGANIST THE FRIENDLY ZEBRAS.
    GET A MONTH REST THEN REGROUP FOR THE WORLD CUP QUALIFYING MATCHES.

    THE FOOTBALL LANDSCAPE IN AFRICA HAS CHANGED AND WE NEED NOT DWELL ON PAST GLORY.

  27. At the end of the day its only one team that will go home with the trophy, true to all the comments all we need now is a deliberate policy to identify striker country wide and put the on a serious prgramme, you can not have strickers from nowhere you need to invest in that.

  28. Coaching is a useless job. When the team wins the players played well. when they loss the coach is bad. What ungreatful job. I feel sorry for Renard.

  29. Mushota said it all and pipo called her names. The coach has to use the best there is and that is what we have at the moment. The boys tried but just failed to score becuase we do not have a goal getter. I was just praying that we have a penalty so that the Tonga bull (Mweene) can score. There should be hungry boys in the rural provinces of Zambia abaminkanda sana. We need strikers who can strike the ball very hard and score even with thier hands who cares. At the moment the boys are all playing like midfielders. Its not the end of the road life continues as minibus conductors continue drinking Benlyn Cough Syrup to intoxicate themself. Pabwato bane!

  30. WHAT A SAD END OF BEING HEROES to ZEROS. This team has just become so complacent Rubbish display of inadequacy to score. MBESUMA?? HE DID THE SAME THING TWICE NIGERIAN GAME & THEN yesterday Day. Clear Goal being given to a goalkeeper??? What a STUPID Striker we have. This exit is so painful especially that we had the best ball control in the whole tournament. THEY BETTER APOLOGISE TO THE ZAMBIAN FUNS. BECAUSE it’s not about them only. It is the whole Nation. KISS GOODBYE TO GOOD SIGNING DEALS AS NO CLUBS WILL WANT TO TAKE RUBBISH PLAYERS.

  31. Am happy pipo are reasoning we should not have benched the captain Katongo for good. the guy is energetic and always rise to the situation. Let the coach decide how he wants to feature players please. Renar is a good player

  32. We are very ungrateful people, now that we lost we want to fault others. In a game there is a winner and loser. So we must accept defeat and arise because that is the attribute of a champion. Name calling is immature, selfish, unreasonable and uncalled. You can’t accept things to go your way all the time, remember our ways are not God’s ways neither our plans God’s.
    Lets count it all joy that we draw and never came out as losers but as victors of glory. This is like going for your child’s school open day and expect him to always remain number one, God is the one who has control for times and seasons. There is time for rejoicing and time for mourning. Lets mourn in joy and receive the team truimphantly.

  33. How did he sneak to RSA to to give our footballers the curse of not returning the cup? I havent mentioned anyone’s name here pizz!!

    Please keep Renard, We all have been to school and we cant blame the teacher whenever we fail yet others succeed in the same class.

    How can u chew the food, without swallowing (scoring)?

    I luv the way we played. keep it up guys dont lose hope, next time u will do better than this.

  34. Hope you are ok and I pray that Zambia’s AFCON exit result of yesterday did not depress you. Herewith some indisputable facts:-

    1. None of the teams in the group will prove that Zambia was a weak team
    2. From the results of the games, there is no evidence that Zambia lost at AFCON
    3. Zambia did not lose a single game at Mbombela stadium
    4. Zambia was not just the best team
    5. Zambia did not lose but just failed to qualify to the next round
    6. Therefore, Zambia’s exit is honorable

    Have a good day

  35. Its a big lesson for HR and the team.Let HR now go back to the drawing board and see what went wrong.And please don’t we have better strikers who can turn and score.Not the ones we used yesterday

  36. it is bitter pill to swallow, but that is life we just have to accept the defeat and forge ahead. Honestly the coach has bear some blames. He could have substituted Mbesuma as he looked useless, maintaining him we payed for it

  37. Didnt know Manu is playing SOTON tonight, its becoz of this useless AFCON thng going on sumwhere. Mayuka go to the airport now, go and Join SOTON so that we give U a good beating kumatako…. Oh my I missed my MANU team…. Madrid alimbe, we are not Zambia…
    Zambia just chase that coach, he is not the only fish in the ocean, he promised the will come back on the tenth of February, wats the date today??? heheheheheheeee

  38. The main problem is our strikers; surely do you need the coach to teach them which leg to shoot with in the box[mbesuma’s two misses-nigeria & b.faso games]. Some players were lost of touch to the game. Very bad performance by the whole team in general except for mweene, he alone stands out. Sinkala was a passenger until the last game when he seemed to have a grip on his position which enabled him to move forward, shoot or make a killer pass. I like the boy my favorite at AFCON 2012 together with chisamba. Back to the drawing board if Herve does not quit; we need to forgive clifford, fwayo, kola & given. These lads are needed in order to bring competition in the team. Drop the perpetual bench warmers…

  39. At least we bowed out with our dignity intact. Better than seeing our team demolished by Ivory coast in a revenge match. if they managed to qualify. We just need to move on now. Lets lift the standards of our local game as a long term strategy. A competitive league in the country will not only lift spirits but potentially a massive source of job creation.

  40. One penalty and one goal from open play defending champions surely???… umusebanya ubukulu even Mamadou Gaye is celebrating now coz he said that Zambia will be eliminated in the first round and it has happened….

  41. Can we all please grieve with respect and stop the blame game? am so devasted, but i cant cry foul and list what could have been or should have, please pipo lets stand together and support the lads as they come back home,If it can be so heart breaking for me, what more them? this is their carreer we are talking about, their lives, their futures, i say whatever happened lets help them get through this, good support needed, for some it can break them bad to an extent of loosing it, they need mental support above all, proper counselling, i ask everyone to be mature enough and help. Am still broken and in shock, viva Chipolopolo viva zambia, we are bigger than this!

  42. I. Our Team had only 9 months to prepare for the defence of trophy. Which is the first in the history of AFCON.
    ii. We had no time to make major changes to our team, hence our team was well known by oponents.
    iii. We prooved that despite being known very well by oponents we are a force to reckon with. We can’t just be easily beaten.
    iv. All west africans were not happy with our success at AFCON 2012, including CAF.
    v. We never lost the game, We did not just qualify.
    vi.Lets support the boys, they made us proud in 2012. If we can cry now what more the Cameroonians who did not even qualify.

  43. THE LADS LOOKED TIRED!!! WE PLAYED BELOW PAR. WE FAILED TO PENETRATE THE DEFENSE.

    THESE ARE THE MATTERS TO LOOK AT. WE NEED TO SHARPEN OUR SCORING WHETHER THERE IS DEFENCE OR NOT.

    STRATEGY 1 – USE OF WINGERS TO SCORE
    STRATEGY 2 – USE OF MANOUVERING TACTICS EVEN IF WE ARE BLOCKED AND SCORE

    WE COMPLETELY FAILED HERE. OUR WEST AFRICAN FRIENDS COULD EASILY PENETRATE!!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT A SHAME.

  44. But we can always say we have one of he best defences and goal keeper. But Chris Katongo wanted to prove why he is BBC Africa Footballer of the year. Mayuka didnt look like ready phsychology for the tonament, so i think. Mbesuma! Intelligence lacked in firing the bal to the keeper’s hands. The tiny Mulenga tho good but too tiny, underweight. OUR STRIKE FORCE DOESN’T KNOW THE ART OF TEARING DEFENCES. Ok, we cn still go enmasse to receive the boys back home. The pride these players have brought to Zambia in their lifetime thus far is something many of us have never done!

  45. The coach has to be blamed, it is his duty to identify talent and/or use his existing players to ensure they are clinical at the goal. How can Mbesuma miss such seaters in a critical game like that??

    Why has he stuck to the same old guys who have clearly faded, we need to infuse new blood in the team. In addition, his timing of substitutions leave much to be desired, how does he give Sakuwaha ten minutes, what contribution can a player make, why not make those changes at least in the 70th minute, if not 60th.

    I feel Jacob Mulenga could have been given more chance to play, Mayuka and Mbesuma playing entire 90 minutes was wrong. But most importantly, his comments likening us to a Corolla as compared to a Benz is insulting and he should just pack his white shirts and go.

    Patrick…

  46. Blaming the coach won’t help.Our players lack basic effort and ingenuity towards the game of football.Mbesuma was foolish to miss that goal.We shouldn’t have lost against minnows Ethiopia,our players are to blame.Katongo was selfish in the first two games.Kalaba sometimes passes the ball like a woman.And no one dies a little for Zambia.The guys can’t even trap and ball-control simple passes.When they shot,they look down.

  47. We just could not finish off our opponents. look at the game against Nigeria, we dominated especially the first half but failed to score. In the game against Burkina Faso we dominated but once again had a blunt front line. Against Ethiopia we were very poor. It is water under the bridge and am sure the technical bench will look at our weaknesses and sharpen up the team as we get into the World Cup qualifiers. That is how football is you fail to capitalize on your chances you get booted out.

  48. Ba ZED, that is the problem with my country men and women. We are good at criticizing without providing solutions. Where is this hell finger accusing finger pointing coming from? We have lost and we are back to our home Country. For me what we need to do is look at where we missed it and work on that mistake. We were not that bad at AFCON except that we did not have the cutting edge kwasila. Don’t blame Renard, Chris, Kalu, the team or GOVT no, we just need to work on our weaknesses. No one wanted to come out but things have happened this way, so bane stop the nonsense. You were going to be the first people to celebrate had Zambia made it. Let us be civilized and accept defeat ba Zambia.

  49. It’s not the fault of coach. There’s no good strikers in the teams. I can see they play well but cannot make a goal. Look at their rubber legs that made me angry when they failed to kick the ball harder or straight to goal. So look and find a real striker like Drogba.

  50. We need a report on what has happened to the African champions.
    Who decided to dress our lads in that inferior jersey? Even in our Komboni football we see better kits than that. Zambia as a nation must be serious.

  51. I think the issue at hand was that majority of the Zambian fans who actually abandoned the team when results became poor since 98 were mislead that the current team had talented individuals beyond reasonable doubt!

    The 2012 AFCON was largely attributed to the fact that the team was really emotionally lifted to play! You could tell they were at ease, the showed composure, and the finishing was brilliant! The game against Ivory Coast in the final was no exception,….! With well taken penalties, and the players singing songs while the Ivorians were busy praying, you could sense the anger, the emotions, the WILL to win was there and it was collective effort on and off the pitch!!

    This AFCON, Zambia now came as a “Now What?”……

    And it showed right from the Sudan game all the way…

  52. …when we kicked off against Ethiopia!

    The team wasn’t even singing the national anthem,…They looked like they were under immense pressure to now perform without any serious motivating factor!!

    The real Zambia that we now know,…(the Zambia that misses the goal from 6 yards, the Zambia that gets dispossessed easily in dangerous areas like the penalty box, the Zambia that fails to string passes, the Zambia that relies heavily on permutations) IS BACK!

    That aside,… Im really hoping we go to Brasil, but im seriously doubting since we can’t even score,…!! Forget the ‘head start’ we have,… We have a home and away play off after the group stage with a SURELY hungry team that we will know after all is said and done!!

  53. People are blaming the coach, Katongo, Mbesuma, etc.. for the failures of the national team. I think blaming the wrong people is being insincere and unrealistic. The blame lies squarely and rightly so on the FAZ, Kalusha and his executives at FAZ have forgotten why they are there and only show up when a major tournament is in progress. Time and time again we hear of a top FAZ official who is only actively interested in kick-backs and nothing else. Why have these serious allegations not been probed into? The powers that be must clean up the FAZ and things will begin to happen.

  54. Everyone who is blaming renard is not really a soccer fan and does not know a thing about soccer.SO PLIZZZ JUST SHUT UP and leave renard alone to concetrate on the World cup qualifiers.

  55. Bane lets focus on the world cup now.Nga twapipa chikalowa.To be realistic the boys were not very bad. Even nakusukulu its the same,waponako mu grade 7 but nga wakosako pakafye ku UNZA.I have seen alot standing up after falling.Greetings to all Zed movers but not to people who always blame without offering solutions and good advice.

  56. Hey its a normal cycle in football. where is Egypt and Cammeroon? These are the countries that have won the AFCON trophy many times. But here they are not participating. Look at spain it came along way to win both the world cup and Euro cup. A trough in their football trend will be witnessed in the next world cup. mark my words.

  57. ZAMBIAN WE HAVE A GOOD COACH AND A GOOD TEAM.

    UBUSHIKU SHEME NECHIMBALA CILOCA.

    WHAT HAS HAPPENED IS A GOOD LESSON TO US AS WE FOCUS ON BRAZIL 2014.

    NO ONE TO BLAME, BUT WE NEED TO LEARN FROM A VERY GOOD LESSON.

    HARD LUCKY BOYS.

  58. Renar knew the lack of quality of our strikers.He asked for Prayers not more players. I think he need both.We won the last afcon coz of Divine intervation.Prayers would not work this time because of lack of FORGIVENESS.Kalu should forgive and recall Singuluma,cliff and fwayo before world cup qualifiers to avoid further disappointments. Matthew 5 v 23 & 24

  59. Mamadou is a dog in a chain why does he always talk about Zambia, Kindly adivise him to be talking about where he comes from, if not so let him talk abou his wife and children. And ba CAF you are useless how do you allow Football to be played in such a rough pitch in this generation. Kalu, Mwamelo and ka Eric Mwanza should have written to CAF and complain about the pitch nomba these administrators are useless.

  60. Herve Renard you costed us the Ethiopia game. How could you substitute Joseph Musonda a defende for Jacob Mulenga when you knew very well that Ethiopia were better than us.(these coaches who can’t read the game awe katwishi). We should have just defended the goal we scored in the first half. Such substitutes are only done by the special one (Jose mourinho).

  61. As far as iam concerned the most pathetic display was from Mayuka, who should’nt have been played at all in this tournament he looks tired,slow and fat, all he was doing at Southampton was warming the bench and getting fat. I mean the chap could’nt even turn swiftly and run fast like he was doing 12 months Ago!!

  62. This coach really hasn’t got what it takes to read the game and make timely decisions effectively. He had no winning formula. His frontline had only one attack method & when it didn’t work, NO PLAN B. They just continued the same failed routine.

  63. The problem with our boys is that they were failing to tram the ore into the tip. All what people want to see is how much is reporting to mill not just stories.

  64. It’s better to seek a real striker then all may go well. Think why did they chose Mweene, a goalkeeper to kick the ball penalty for them? I can’t believe this. The coach did a good job but he cannot find someone like Drogba or Katongo.

  65. Herve..what do you mean “its our fault”? its your fault damn it! maybe now your salary will be reduced drastically.

  66. wen they were playing friendly b4 CAF they were drawing, & lenard said we are reserving goals for the CAF, in the first rnd they drew, 2nd they drew and b4 the 3rd & final groupe stage thye said its a must win game. but they couldn’t win, and now lenard says it was a stepping stone to WORLD CUP 2014.. Imwe put it in sch terms G7 fail, G9 fail &you hear the teacher telling you that your child is making stepping stone to G12 eXaMs

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