Shepolopolo Zambia late on Saturday evening kicked off their two-match friendly visit to Colombia with a defeat.
Zambia lost 1-0 in Cali in the two sides’ debut international meeting.
The game came just 24 hours after Zambia’s late arrival in Colombia following a USA transit visa issue that saw the journey reroute through Spain.
Saturday’s lone goal came in the 5th minute through Catalina Ramirez who tapped in the ball on the rebound after Lorena Bedoya’s long-range volley came off the post.
Three minutes later, Grace Chanda and Ireen Lungu were denied in quick succession by goalkeeper Catalina Perez.
In the last quarter of the first half, Rachel Nachula who ended her two-year Zambia exile sent a sitter wide while Ochumba Lubanji skied the ball.
But Zambia was missing left-back Martha Tembo who did not travel for the friendly following her mother’s passing last week.
Zambia struggled on that front to deal with Colombia’s Ivonne Chacon as the swift winger troubled the visitors throughout the match.
Chacon again gave Zambia a nasty scare in the 54th minute when she found space between defender Agness Musesa and goalkeeper Hazel Nali but headed the ball wide.
Meanwhile, a clearly jet-lagged Zambia then spent most of the second half camped just inside their area but Colombia offered very little serious threat apart from Chacon’s runs.
However, Rachel Kundananji came close to equalizing in the 75 minutes when she sliced through Colombia’s backline with a ball from a Chanda pass but shot narrowly wide of the near post.
Nali then saved Zambia in the 85th minute when she tipped over Catalina Usme’s booming volley delivered from the edge of the box.
Daniela Arias’s header from the resultant corner flew out for a goal kick as Zambia settled for a narrow away defeat.
Colombia and Zambia meet on their final friendly date on November 15 at the same venue.
The two sides are using the friendlies as early warm-up ahead of their 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup outing from July 20-August 20 to be jointly hosted by Australia and New Zealand.
It’s not right to have our team subjected to playing without rest. The matter of visas should be adequately addressed. We know that transit visas through the US and UK are difficult to get. We should therefore make the arrangements early. Nothing stops us from applying one month in advance. That is the way to do it. Emmergency visas will always be a problem
You styupid, why not advocate other countries to go to your Zambia? Colombia was supposed to be in Ndola this week.
Why are you so negative like that male coach of Zambia? Complaining and shouting girls down. Girls can’t play good with their father screaming at them. Let the female coaches be on touch line, and get instructions from that man.
The girls played fantastic well.
Nachula and Kundananji played a mature game.
Then those 2 young Esters in defense were fantastic, except the coach don’t allow them to go forward to score.
Bruce Mwape is an excellent coach. The thing I would like him to clamp down is the selfishness of our forward like Mapepa, Kundananji and Grace Chanda. None of them want to pass the ball to a person who is in a superior position, as each tries to score by herself. I saw too much of this from Mapepa in the Africa Cup of nations, and it needs to stop. To be fair, Colombia played Zambia without Barbara Banda, Lushomo Mweembe and Martha Tembo, all of whom are stalwarts in our team. Even then, we had them fighting for dear life.
VISA issues, KiKiKi. That clearly means the association is full of in competent humans who just want to fatten their belly. Learn how to perform great with LOGISTICS dummies.
–incompetent–