Warriors seek redemption against Comoros

MICHAEL KARIATI

Embattled Zimbabwe Warriors will seek redemption when they plunge into their opening Cosafa Cup Group B  battle with a rapidly improved Comoros this afternoon in Port Elizabeth, South Africa.

They will play bitter rivals Zambia on Sunday and Kenya on Tuesday next week to complete their round-robin schedule.

Following their recent 2-0 World Cup loss to Lesotho and 3-1 loss to South Africa, the Warriors, led by Jairos Tapera, are under pressure to win back the hearts of the supporters.

Zimbabwe has six titles including back-to-back championships in 2017 and 2018 which were cemented with other successes in 2000, 2003, 2005 and on home soil in 2009.

Today is the first game of Tapera’s Cosafa Cup voyage. His team will play Comoros, who have improved over the years and are currently ranked 119th in the world, significantly higher than Zimbabwe’s 129th spot.

What’s more significant is that, as they continue to get ready for the Afcon 2025 and World Cup 2026, the Comoros have brought their finest team to the Cosafa Cup, whereas for Zimbabwe, nobody is really sure who picked the team —the coach or those at the Zifa Office.

Even more depressing is the fact that Tapera’s team is playing against a Comoros team that is leading its World Cup qualifying group over Ghana, Madagascar, Mali, Central Africa Republic, and Chad, and that they have had little time to prepare because of issues with team selection and camping.

Tawanda Tafirenyika, a football analyst, claims that the Warriors perform better in times of adversity.

“History will tell you that there has never been normalcy in the Warriors camp. The bigger the problems, the better they play. The Warriors will surprise everyone,” predicts Tafirenyika.

Warriors captain, Godknows Murwira is confident.

“Man to man, I think we are equal or even better than most of the teams at Cosafa.

“We are going there to play football and to win, and win, we will,” says Murwira.

A win for Zimbabwe against the Comoros could boost confidence and also bring back self belief ahead of the other Group B matches against Kenya and seven time champions Zambia.

The Chipolopolo — in particular— will not be easy as they are also going through a rough patch following two successive World Cup losses and are also using the Cosafa Cup to try to revive their flagging fortunes.