Friday, March 29, 2024

Zambia in late-comer drama for AFCON

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Zambia is expected to arrive in Equatorial Guinea on the eve of the Africa Cup kickoff on Friday.

According to the arrival schedule released by CAF, Honour Janza’s side is expected to land in Equatorial Guinea at 12h00 local time on Wednesday.

Zambia has been camped in South Africa for the past three weeks to prepare for the Africa Cup.

There are scanty details on Chipolopolo’s pending journey from their training base in Johannesburg to Equatorial Guinea after they were earlier expected back home on January 11 to catch a flight from Lusaka to Equatorial Guinea.

However, reports now state that Zambia will fly out on Thursday on Ethiopian Airlines from Johannesburg and land in Malabo via Addis Ababa on Friday, just 48 hours before they face DR Congo in their Group B opener.

From Malabo, Zambia will take another roughly 45 minute hop by air from the island to the mainland to Mongomo and later take a 45 minute drive on the last leg to their Group B base in Ebebiyin.

The news brings back Zambia’s recent travel ordeals during a dramatic 2015 Africa Cup qualifying run whose highlight came on September 9 when they arrived at dawn on the day of the match against Cape Verde that they lost 2-1.

43 COMMENTS

    • If there isn’t even a proper travel plan, can one expect FAZ to even have strategy to succeed in the tournament? What a waste of time! Who’s Kalusha blaming this time?

    • @Nostradamus
      please please please Nostra! Kambwili is a very busy man at the moment,,,, footbal will come later,, Kambwili commanded kalu to make sure that Janza wins a the AFCON or else jail

  1. We never seem to learn from past mistakes. being a CEO of an organisation, requires specific qualifications and being a former footballer is not one of them.

  2. What version of English are we reading here? In one version we are being told that the team will arrive on the eve of the championship kickoff, in the other version we’re being told the team will leave on Wednesday. So which is which?

  3. I wonder why we do such, it only shows how organized our Ministry of Sport and FAZ teams are. I feel for our boys.

  4. If these sports managers were a team of doctors, would have a million cemeteries.simply we don’t learn.ma dallo yeka yeka.

  5. lets talk abt afcon u av so many headlines on this site which talks abt politics and compaigns naifike bwangu wednesday mwee fimo fikalwele diarrhoea na heart attack. if u continue talkin abt one person or party tt means he is a threat to u and tts y edgar is winning u a jst making him popular.

  6. Janza there is your excuse i am happy for you, when you come back early as expected just blame that but even if you went 2 month early with the team you have carried and your lack of understanding the game and being Kalu’s puppet there was nothing you could have done anyway.

  7. Kalusha Bwalya is behaving as if he has never played soccer and worse enough he is the FAZ president. I call for him to quit.

  8. Why are they always making travelling mistakes always! They got to be serious ,whoever is responsible!not this crap,

  9. This is not FAZ’s problem but government’s. The govt has the responsibility to fund all sports and at the moment there seems to be no govt in place because all of them have gone on a campaign trail to secure their jobs so that the looting can continue. This clearly shows that the gvt has ground to a halt because non of the ministers are working. Besides, parties in power have a tendency of diverting tax payers money towards party activities. So far all the money has gone towards funding Guy Scotts useless country tours that are nothing but campaign trails. Obviously the argument is that he is entitled because he is president. But I am sure we need to have priorities. All those following him around have to be paid huge subsistence allowances. Chipolopolo Boys are forgotten.

  10. This is the problem when Corruption comes first, which is a Cancer in our country.
    Rather than book tickets, & fly to the destination, someone first thinks of how he can corruptly manipulate the prices, then inflate the invoice, & pocket the difference.
    Its NOT ONLY in Football. Our P.F, Government, & ruling parties before ran things this way.
    Same officials if told there was Sex, or Money for them involved, would be there on time.

  11. Ba Lipota muziendako kusukulu before reporting. The report above is all confusion:
    Some of the sentences are toooooo long for nothing:
    “However, reports now state that Zambia will fly out on Thursday on Ethiopian Airlines from Johannesburg and land in Malabo via Addis Ababa on Friday, just 48 hours before they face DR Congo in their Group B opener.
    My English teacher would have written that this way:
    However, reports are that Zambia will fly Ethiopian Airlines from Johannesburg on Thursday. They will stop over for one night in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Chipolopolo will arrive in the Guinean capital of Malabo on Friday. This will be just 48 hours before they face DR Congo in their Group B opener.
    Much more clearer sichoncho?

  12. This is what you expect when a minister in charge is busy buying prostitutes and giving daga and money to street boys to be causing havoc for his party. This is government responsibility.

  13. Whether they arrive early or late it will not make any difference. Some people say it is the same difference. Zambia is at this tournament to make numbers , nothing else.

  14. Kalu said already that zambia are just going there as mere participants not to win the afcon.with such utterances you should not expect any serious commitment in dealing with all logistics required by the team.

  15. Whats the fuss about the travel arrangements? From this article its clear they will arrive friday and playing Sunday and if i try to make sense out of this, it appears the writer wanted to say they are arriving 12.00 local time on friday but instead wrote wednesday simply because its wednesday today. Anyway, we can all make such an error especially when one is too excited. Good luck chipolopolo and the supporters. Remember Dennis used to say “Lets wait and see.” Mind no one expected Zambia to win in 2012 so why should we now but don’t write them off. Am sure they will not disappoint. Its a new team and the young copper bullets have many tournaments ahead of them. See you Sunday boys. Go for gold. I will be watching with some DR Congolese. Word is that they cannot wait to whip us.

    • I agree with your accession of the matter. Answering your Q. past arrangement was that they fly home 11.01 thereafter fly to west Africa. This did not happen. (2) SA already heading to the tounament.. vimpolopolo, what are they doing in a foreign country??

  16. Everything is wrong about Zambia, the coach has no experience and past record to show for, only a certificate, this cannot work anywhere in the footballing world, poor management at FAZ is the order of the day, but we still return the same people.

    Zambia we deserve much much better . I will not be surprised with a first round knock out .

    Watch this space.

  17. Poor Zambia, WHY CAMPING IN SA???? There is no reason to justify this. SA has own aircrafts to use while you Zambians has to beg. Camping should have been in North Africa possibly neighbouring countries to the host. 3wks in SA = malabisi, waste of money.. The boys will arrive at AFCON tired. If they loss the first game, second games do not blame them.

  18. They were camped at Kalusha’s house. Surely all involved knew the start date of the tournament; couldn’t they have done some home work? This is embarrassing to say the least.
    We have people being paid and drawing allowances for doing nothing. It can only be in Zambia where performance is not a necessity to keep ones job. This is the reason why even non performing ministers can be given more than one ministry to run.
    If this is what Fat Albert Kambwili calls performance; then that fake degree should be withdrawn from him. NOW THIS IS A HIGH PERFORMING MINISTER IN PF- My foot!

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