Warriors Gear Up For Crucial AFCON Qualifier Against Kenya
Zimbabwe national football team coach, Michael Nees, says the Warriors are in high spirits ahead of their crucial Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) qualifier against Kenya this Friday at Peter Mokaba Stadium in South Africa. The match is set to kick off at 6 PM.
With qualification on the line, Zimbabwe must avoid defeat to secure a spot in the AFCON finals. Meanwhile, Kenya needs an outright win to keep their qualification hopes alive.
Speaking on Thursday, Nees said that while the Warriors are confident, they will not underestimate Kenya and are focused on securing a positive result. He said:
Everyone knows what is at stake. It’s an important game for Kenya. For us, it’s a very decisive game and it’s a very important game because we are in quite a good position.
But we know how football is like, you cannot predict results. You can plan on your performance and if it’s a good performance, a positive result is very likely.
So far, our preparations were a little bit hampered by the rain, but not too much. We trained the day before yesterday and we trained yesterday [Wednesday].
We have quite some good conditions. Where we stay, the pitch took a lot of water but we could train.
The team is in good spirits, confident, but not overconfident, but I think we can look positively to the game with respect to the opponent, but also with great belief in our own abilities.
According to Nees, the Warriors’ technical team has gathered ample information about Kenya and is well-prepared for the match, knowing exactly what to expect. He said:
We analysed Kenya in the first match and we re-evaluated for this match. They are a very good team no doubt, a very stubborn team.
Maybe their confidence has been shaken by the two defeats to Cameroon, but nevertheless, I think in their starting line-up, they will have only two players who play in Kenya. They have players playing in Sweden, Qatar, Poland and so on.
This is a team which has quality and has worked for a while with the coach, but we know what to expect. We played against them and we analysed them and it was a really interesting game.
We have to focus on our task and not think about the other team, but to think about our own strengths.
When you want to achieve something, you have to work for it and not expect things to just happen.
If we do that, we fall on our nose. We need to work and our target is first a good performance and then a positive result.
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