Zambia: Arrows, Zanaco Gun for Top Slot

18 June 2011

With MTN Premier Division leaders Power Dynamos out of action, Red Arrows and Zanaco will fancy their chances of leapfrogging the Kitwe outfit from the summit of the table after the three Week 12 matches on display today.

Third placed Arrows who have 19 points, two fewer than Power, host lowly placed Kabwe Warriors who have made a bad start to the campaign while Zanaco will be at cross town rivals Green Buffaloes at Woodlands Stadium. Arrows vs Warriors (live on SuperSport 9)

If Arrows manage to preserve their good home record and get a win, they will supplant Power off their perch with a game in hand but they should not expect a stroll in the park against the resurgent Warriors.

Arrows will have to fashion something out of the fixture the hard way without Jimmy Chisenga who, alongside Joseph Zimba, have become their bedrock in defence since the departure of Kamzati Kabwe in the close season.

Chisenga will be away on national duty with the Under-23 team against Algeria in Chingola; the same fixture that has left Warriors’s stand-in coach Humphrey Malikoni without the midfield industry of Roderick Kabwe and Richard Kasonde.

Arrows coach George Lwandamina has a point to prove against Warriors who fired him within weeks of his appointment last season and his prayer will be that striker Adubelo Phiri does not forget his scoring boots like he has done in the last three games

Buffaloes vs Zanaco

Free falling Buffaloes welcome the league’s highest scorers, Zanaco, seeking to exorcise the ghost that has bedeviled them in recent matches when they have drifted in and out of form to the extent that they are now in distant eighth place.

Buffaloes coach Aggrey Chiyangi will, however, take heart from the fact that despite occupying eighth position, they are only six points off the pace and with a game in hand, but he knows too well that they need to start bridging that gap while the sun still shines.

The “Bankers” have quickly arrested their early season blip and coach Wedson Nyirenda will hope to get one better than his former international teammate Chiyangi.

Should Allan Mukuka be given a run out by Chiyangi, it will be the first time the junior international will face his former teammates and he could excel in midfield in the absence of Simon Silwimba, the only gem Nyirenda managed to keep.

Nakambala vs Rangers

This match-up pits two teams that lost their last games and will want to restore their battered pride, especially Nchanga Rangers whose loss came at home to Power while Nakambala were gunned down by Forest Rangers.

At their unusually wide home ground, Nakambala rarely drop points so, Rangers will have to be at their best to make their trek across three provinces worthwhile, hoping Lewis Macha can tick in a province where he cut his teeth at Kalomo Jetters.

A win for Rangers will take them to within touching distance of the summit. A Nakambala success could take them back to the top of the table where they provisionally perched before they discovered that they had taken a bite more than they could chew.

AllAfrica – All the Time