One team is expected to book a slot in the Zamadolo Season Six as FCB Nyasa Big Bullets and Civil Service United are facing off at the Kamuzu Stadium this afternoon.
Two teams, 2018 winners, Blue Eagles and Salima based Soldiers, MAFCO Football Club already sneaked into the last four after booting out Moyale Barracks and Kamuzu Barracks respectively in the two-legged quarterfinals.
The People’s Team are going into today’s fixture after claiming a 2-0 win in the first leg at the Civo Stadium where Hassan Kajoke and Maxwell Phodo Gastin scored for Pasuwa’s men.
Despite carrying a 2-goal deficit, Civil’s Assistant Coach, Wilson Chidati carries high hopes that they can turn tables this afternoon at the Fortress Soccermeca.
“If [FCB Nyasa Big] scored two here, we can go there and scored 10 goals at Kamuzu Stadium,” Chidati said after a 2-0 defeat at home.
Civil Service United came nearly to pull their first win over the Blantyre based giants since 2015 in their last visit to Kamuzu Stadium. The Servants took a two-goal advantage before Bullets turned tables in the second half with Patrick Mwaungulu scoring the winner. He has scored two in two games against Civil this season. The Servants last beat Bullets in 2015 in the Standard Bank Cup and they have lost two games in three this season.
With a trimmed Squad, Kalisto Pasuwa managed to expose how Civil have regressed nowadays when they faced off in the first leg.
Their current most in-form player, Patrick Mwangulu, their arguably their best defender so far, Clyde Senaji, Lanjesi Nkhoma, Yamikani Fodya were not even in the matchday squad. Ernest Petro, Alick Lungu, Mike Mkwate were on the sideline due to respective injuries while Gomezgan Chirwa, Frank Willard, Precious Sambani, Peter Banda, Ephraim Kondowe, Hassan Kajoke were all on the bench but they put two past Civil Service United and take a giant step towards the semi-finals of the Airtel Top 8 Cup.
“Sitimafuna Zowalirana,” that’s Civil’s motto, but many teams have had mockery of this expression. Even after sacking Oscar Kaunda, though they said that he has been deployed, Civil are still progressing backwards.
Many would doubt how Bullets would prevail with the majority of their key players not starting, but Civil Service United were such leaky to give themselves a Mountain Sinai to climb in the second leg at the Kamuzu Stadium, the venue that they haven’t chalked a win over Bullets in over 10 years.
The Servants have conceded 25 goals in the super league but they have just scored 23, they carry a goal difference of -3 but they are in records of one of the teams that won the league, could they dream of it nowadays according to how they have regressed?
Despite the graph showing Civil going downwards, Pasuwa still thinks that they can still pull a shocker this afternoon and the game is not over.
“Civil [are] a good side, a team that plays with structure. The game is not over on us. Remember, we played 90 minutes in Lilongwe and we are also playing 90 minutes in Blantyre.
“Civil play with good intensity. We are not taking it lightly and we will try our best in order to get a result.
“But again, we have been talking about injuries in the squad. Yah, we need to manage intensity in order for us to finish 90 minutes.
“The boys are okay but again, remember we told you that we are resting one day, the next day we do light training then we train, in most cases we are trying to make these guys recover but also we can’t do anything, games are coming each and every three days and also the worst part of it [is that] am losing players in each game that we are playing. This is the main thing which is affecting us and if you can look in our squad, almost 15 players are outside,” he said.
The Zimbabwean mentor revealed that Stanley Billiati and Ephraim Kondowe picked knocks in their midweek game against Kamuzu Barracks and they are expected to be out of the matchday squad.
He told the Club’s Media, “In the game that we played in midweek, we lost Stanley Billiati, we lost Kondowe then also we lost Patrick Mwangulu and Clyde Senaji who is not also part of the team.
“That’s what football is all about but I will have to be crying everyday because seriously speaking the way we are playing games, I don’t see ourselves lasting distance. It’s too much for us.”
FCB Nyasa Big Bullets are going into this second leg of the game carrying a good form after winning six of their last seven games in three competitions. They beat Mighty Tigers, Moyale Barracks, Chitipa United and Kamuzu Barracks in the super league, beating Mafco FC and Civil Service United in the FDH Bank Cup and Airtel respectively.
