THE Flames\u2019 will finally take the first step in their quest for a maiden appearance at the African Nations Championship finals by flying to Madagascar this afternoon from Chileka Airport in Blantyre.<\/p>\n
The team will first fly to Nairobi, Kenya, for a friendly match against the Harambee Stars on Tuesday before starting off for the Indian Ocean island nation. Making the trip are 20 players, with Nyasa Big Bullets\u2019<\/p>\n
Ernest Kakhobwe, Lemani Nthala of Kamuzu Barracks and Silver Strikers\u2019 Bright Munthali picked up as goalkeepers. Defenders are Pempho Kansichiri, Yamikani Fodya, Francis Mlimbika, Stanley Sanudi, John Lanjesi and Lucky Malata.<\/p>\n
Nine midfielders- Dave Banda, Levison Maganizo, Simeon Singa, Harvey Nkacha, Dalitso Sailesi, Kelvin Hanganda, Gilbert Chirwa, Yamikani Chester and Chimango Kaira have made the trip. Coach Ronny van<\/p>\n
Geneugden will have very few options in attack as he has only two strikers in Kamuzu Barracks\u2019 Manase Chiesa and Bullets\u2019 Muhammad Sulumba. Gerald Phiri Senior and De Klerk Msakakuona will travel as the Belgian\u2019s assistants, with Peter Mponda taking up the role of team manager.<\/p>\n
Phillip Nyasulu and Levison Mwale will make the trip as goalkeeper trainer and team doctor respectively. Football Association of Malawi Vice President, James Mwenda, will lead the delegation which departs<\/p>\n
Chileka Airport at 2 o\u2019clock in the afternoon. Mponda said Bullets and Kamuzu Barracks national team players who were released for yesterday\u2019s Chifundo Charity Shield match, will fly from Kamuzu International Airport before being joined by their colleagues at Chileka.<\/p>\n
Phiri Senior justified the inclusion of three goalkeepers for the trip, saying it is a safety measure to guard against injuries. He also ruled out any concerns on the selection of only two strikers for the away match.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of our midfielders are attack-minded. Should the need arise, we can play any one of them in front. We have also picked three goalkeepers because we do not want to face a situation where we remain with just one goalkeeper where the other gets injured or is redcarded,\u201d Phiri Senior said.<\/p>\n
On the team\u2019s game plan, Phiri said the intention will be to attack while also minding the defence. He said the team will aim at getting a point in the away match.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
THE Flames\u2019 will finally take the first step in their quest for a maiden appearance at the African Nations Championship finals by flying to Madagascar this afternoon from Chileka Airport in Blantyre. The team will first fly to Nairobi, Kenya, for a friendly match against the Harambee Stars on Tuesday before starting off for the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":42290,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44492"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44492\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44495,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44492\/revisions\/44495"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}