10-man Zambia failed to hold on 1-0 lead in Maseru today only to finish 1-1 with Lesotho in a 2014 World Cup Group D qualifier.
Zambia were reduced to 10-men after goalkeeper Kennedy Mweene was sent off in the 53rd minute.
Mweene suicidal tackle on Mojela Letsie saved Zambia’s blushes coming after Stopilla Sunzu poor back-pass was picked out by the Lesotho striker.
Mweene’s departure saw Fwayo Tembo scarified for Joshua Titima.
The goalkeepers sent-off didn’t dampen Zambia’s morale and Collins Mbesuma who was on-fire throughout the game hit the post with a header off Isaac Chansa corner in the 65th minute.
Mbeusma made no mistake the second time in the 75th minute again from a Chansa corner to thunder home a header 1-0.
His goal made up for his 12th minute clear goal that was mysteriously disallowed by referee Diehiou Malang when the Zambia striker clearly poked in the ball under the challenge from Moitheri Ntobo and not the reverse.
However, Zambia’s hopes of leaving Maseru with the three points were dashed when Litsepe Marabe sealed the draw in the 88th minute.
Marabe dragged Sunzu and Hichani Himonde to one side before side stepping the defence to whip in a volley past Titima.
There truly is one truism about Zambian football that we have become natural poor. Basic rules of logic dictate that we overhaul our team and concentrate on mostly young and local players. Again, our captain Chris Katongo was a weak link. Looking at his game play, it is clear that he has a lot of pressure on his head because of the following:
1. Winning the Africa Cup
2. Winning the BBC African footballer of the year 2012
3. Under-performing as an individual at AFCON 2013
Because of the above, he has been playing as an individual and not as a team because he seems to want to prove his critics wrong by for example scoring the winning goal in a place like Maseru. The end result has been total disaster.
The coach has not helped matters at all. How can you rest Chisamba Lungu8 and…
we must be crowned as champions of draws to make up for the one year we lost as AFCON champions.
Tuli ma fi ye chapwa, ne mbwa wa chindama po. Ata lyonse fimofine
jay-jay,,
you are really annoyed.
wafilwa nokulemba bwino icibemba.
mwandi aka ka coach ka feki…
lets look for a better coach if we really need to up our game.
What do you expect from PF and Kambwili and Masumba. You are lucky you got a draw. Everything about Zambia is going wrong even soccer is going wrong. Where did we go wrong as a country. How can we steep so low.
I now acknowledge that I have been expecting too much from the chipolopolo team that is not even an average team. Simply, we are not just good enough.
This is what is known as UKUPWA, no wonder we couldn’t defend our championship, Minister of Sport Kambwili, let heads roll this is too much of an embarrassment! They were too over confident what now!
WHERE IS HE? Dario Bonetti, where are you? Come back and help Zambia prepare for Brazil 2014. Herve Renard can take over from you a month before the tournament in Brazil.
How is bringing in Dario Bonetti moving forward? Why do you have this tunnel vision as fans? Even simple head hunting for successors is a problem.
Wake up!!
Where was Jacob Mulenga & Chisamba Lungu? And why play an injured Sunzu? Ghana is leading Sudan 2-0 as I write this … . Chris Katongo should have been rested for Mayuka.
bla bla!!! did zed win the cup like Chelsea?? anyway this team is under performing draw with Ethopia costed us now we r counting our chances after the Maseru draw a team we shld have got the easy 3 points…this was the easiest chance to qualify for Rio….whats the way forward??
we have a useless coach, thats the way forward…
In life you play your role & leave the rest to younger generations before you start destroying memories of your positive contribution. Let’s admit that Herve Renard, Kalusha Bwalya, Chris Katongo, Himoonde Hichani, Nathan Sinkala & Musonda have played their part and should leave Zambian soccer in the hands of others. Herve Renard is very poor at reading the game & worse at understanding his players. This result is proof that we would embarrass Africa if were to qualify for Brazil with this coach & team.
Sadly Zambians are reactive as opposed to being proactive and frustratingly they also too slow to react and are docile…. the writing is already (and has always been) on the wall; Renard is tactically deficient to read a match and FAZ is highly incompetent and appalling pre-match organisers.
“One problem we have in the team is that so many players are not playing well and to their full potential. Our players being at TP Mazembe has affected the national team,” Renard said after the match.
How many times have I pointed this out? Why is the coach using these players and why isn’t FAZ talking to TP as this is clearly affecting overall national team performance? I hope we don’t qualify to the World cup with this FAZ admin and HR as we will be humiliated in Brazil if we ever qualify.
our coach is of sub-standard period.
fire this tactless useful ***** before we are embarrassed beyond this.
The defence team and the goalie cannot keep us at the top. Zambia now needs goal scoring forwards.
The coaching staff must focus on scoring gaols, that is what will separate our team from others. How can we draw with Lesotho, and coming away with only one point? One wonders if the late road travel was a bad thing after all, and the brief prep yesterday was a sign of underrating the opponent? This has proved fatal. We need to be aggressive until the game is played and finished. We go into games without agency and with unnecessary ease.
We must now forget the past glories, and forcefully move forward to consolidate our position in the world.
Not “agency”, but “urgency”.
Zambia ma fi ya mbwa
iwe, stop insulting us because of a few useless individuals.
you should have said, ‘footballers nimbwa sheka sheka.’
Ghana 4 Sudan 0 FT
Zambia needs to fire the coach. This chap is just a mere soccer fan, the fact that he was accidently present wen we won CAF 12 does not make him a good coach.
And who brought him and who is continues keeping him?
jay jay naufulwa mwandi. naine i cant stomach this. sure tu lesotho mwe bantu? ba kalu and your south african life style we dont need it. be in lusaka and run faz properly. i think the reason you always send the team for training and preps in SA is because thats where your home is mambala. busy enjoying with your white wife instead of running faz. if you dont want to be in zambia,leave us and stay with your wife ku SA. dont drag FAZ down with you.
Ba zagaze
Spot on …FAZ needs someone with eyes focused on the ball, imagine if the FAZ Chief resides in RSA how do you expect him to build training facilities in Zambia when all his business interests are in RSA. How much money have the pumped into RSA over the years with no exit strategy?? Only when our people wake up and stop hero worshipping will we move forward.
Renard is being ornted by his failure to forgive the briliant player Clifford Mulenga and HR’s fall will be great
Very useless players together with their coach. They like playing lazy game where they don’t run but just walk , while their opponents run. They take it easy while time keeps on ticking . When there are 3 minutes remaining to the end of the game is when they start running, what a dull coach and his players. Why can,t they play with urgency and attacking? I am really annoyed by these guys….
It is a sad moment to mother Zambia.
Yaabaa!! Ba Chipoloplolo, I will just leave them alone, my sister in support of them just told me that they were not playing on their home ground, as if they did us proud, UMUSEBANYA (so it is just draws even with small teams – no wonder they are saying winning the Africa Cup was a fluke].
Herve Renard must be fired! Its clear that he is a poor coach! look at his starting 11 and his substitutes; very poor indeed!
KA KALABA KWENA NA KAPWA .NIBA GELO ?
Wait for ba CAF to conform about Musonda’s two yellow cards. FAZ will be in big hot soup!
Blaming the PF for smuggling may not be fair and there isn’t much that can be done about it because the population of DR Congo is about 76 million compared to 15 million people that of Zambia. Even if the entire Zambian population was to substitute mining & others for Agriculture to feed DRC, Zambia’s area of 752,614 sq. km compared to DRC’s area of 2,345,410 is not sufficient to feed our colleagues. Smuggling has never stopped or reduced at any given time in history, it is just that the media during MMD Govt was only reporting on RB and his family and turned away cameras from real issues unlike the PF which has turned the media cameras on ordinary Zambian and economy. The solution is to embrace maize meal export and use proceeds to import the shortfall from other cheaper countries.
My fellow readers, please ignore this contribution is meant for a different article. I regret the inconvience.
you are just dull, why is it that even in the RB govt,people still never used to line up for mealie meal. am sure the factors you used in this analysis of yours like population and land in zambia and congo were about the same three-four years ago yet lining up for mealie wasnt there. just accept sometimes nganaba bonganya ba pf. dont just support fyonse nefyabupa. ati they were busy covering RB,bufi sana. check your facts mdala.
Chipolopolo iye, we are behind you, lets go boys, just 3 games to go, we are in Brazil. Yes we shall
Sorry 4 games, tiyeni baiche, Fwayo, Mbesuma, Katongo, Mweene, tiyeni
nokupendatawaishiba…
what four games? name them..
Players have done the country proud in difficult circumstances under suspect FAZ leadership and still need to be praised for that. The Zambian coach is not only a suspect but real chancer and decision needs to be made now before we lose the FIFA goodwill of 3 free points. Try young Zambians like Beston, Lota, Kaumba, Wedson Nyirenda, Kamwanga. Hon. Kambwili and National Sports Council need to act on Kalusha and FAZ. Obviously these leaders have outlived their usefulness and can only continue sacrificing players. Honestly, with all these misfortunes our team has been facing, can one continue camping them in South Africa and make them travel by road to Lesotho. What savings are we talking about when we can afford to camp outside the country unnecessarily and what are we learning from RSA?
That was below par performance ! However , we can easily up our game ! We need not to play names !Play form players ! We need more aggression ! Still all to play for !
These players don’t learn, I think the habit of bringing them to Joburg is utter rubbish. These players have friends who am not gonna mention names for their privacy sake, who book extra rooms at Milpack hotel for their South African girlfriends how do you expect to win like that? I was talking to one of them last Wednsday that they ought to stop whtever they are doing to the players because it’s evil.
SEMBE…….
NOW, PLAYING FOR TP MAZEMBE HAS ALSO GOT TO STOP BEING THE CRITERIA FOR NATIONAL TEAM SELECTION. APART FROM KATUMBI FLASHING US DOLLARS AROUND, HOW COMPETITIVE IS THE DRC LEAGUE (IF THERE’S EVEN ONE)?
PLAYERS WHOSE FORM AND SKILLS CONTINUE TO GO DOWN SINCE OUR AFCON 2012 TRIUMPH:
1. CHRISTOPHER KATONGO – Very selfish & knows no difference between BEING EFFECTIVE and LOOKING busy.
2. EMMANUEL MAYUKA ( His agent must even be asking that he be loaned out of Southampton) – always allows defenders to find the better of him. Not mobile & lacks innovation
3. RAINFORD KALABA – Always looking like he’s joking when a situation calls for seriousness. 4. NATHAN SINKALA – getting too slow, temperamental, confused and very rough
5. HIMOONDE HICHANI – Hope he realises in one of the future matches that the game has started, and that him losing the ball spells trouble for the country 6. NKAUSU – Never sure of himself & always looking for approval of his every move by the spectators and…
One draw too many! The coach should be fired, we need new ideas Renard has failed. Training in South Africa should come to end, it is a waste of money.
Tactically Ghana stands a 100% chance to qualify for world cup Rio Brazil.Zambians sure for how long are we going tolerate “zabvuta cabe kugolisa” ? How do prepare in soweto south africa and draw with an academy sporting team? Do the coach, kalusha bwalya and his technical bench really know that losing such a game is an embarrasement to the soccer fratenity in zambia? Copper bullets should change to copper blunks. FAZ and Coaching Bench need to step down and pave way for new Administrators. Haa..! ati masebela yamene mucita bvima players imwe you cannot die a lot for your country. BIG SHAME ALA
One ngwe i like your observasiona. In short we need an overhaul oif the technical bench and team players. How can we fail to beat lesotho.they were plaing like ethiopia and the coach coulod not read. we were playing like a trainning game, useless players. they are jst enjoing tax payers’ money especially those drc based players, they have been finished by rumba girls, they are tired and can not perform, useless. i wont watch the remaining games rest my BP accumulates for nothing. i will only start watchinbg woth a new coach and without selfish C. katongo.
It’s simple; fire the coach. This string of very POOR results has shown that our Afcon 2012 win was a fluke. Send Herve packing back to France napapata ba FAZ
Football iz not like the Grade Seven Examination with A, B, C, D or non of the bove type of answerz. So there iz no such a thing az winning by a fluke. We won the AFCON fair and square!
Harve Renard and about half the 2012 victorious team memberz must be thanked and we part wayz. Then another crop of playerz, hungry for new challengez and success, must be drafted in the squad. Fighton Simukonda, Wesley Mondo and Dan Kabwe should be given good ideal performance bazed contracts to drill the team. Lozing (oh we drew?) to Lesotho iz criminal to say the least. Might az well forget about Brazil 2014…