Malawi\u2019s representatives in Confederation of African Football (Caf) competitions, Be Forward Wanderers and Masters Security, have been drawn against relatively tough opponents for the Champions League and the Confederation Cup.
\nThe pairings were done yesterday at Caf\u2019s headquarters in Cairo, Egypt, and Wanderers drew AS Vita of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in their return to the Champions League whereas Masters have been pitted against Atletico Petroleos of Angola in their maiden continental appearance.
\nThe Nomads, who are on the verge of winning the TNM Super League championship this season after an 11-year wait, will begin their campaign with a home fixture on February 9 in Lilongwe before playing the return leg a week later.
\nBut Masters will start with an away fixture in Angola before getting the chance to play at home..
\nBoth local teams will start from the preliminary rounds.
\nWanderers Team Manager, Steve Madeira, said his team will be ready for the tournament come February.
\n\u201cWe know there is a big challenge ahead of us but we are going there to compete. By February, we will be ready for the big stage and, hopefully, we will go through to the next round,\u201d Madeira said.
\nThe Nomads\u2019 Captain, Joseph Kamwendo, who had a stint with DRC giants TP Mazembe, said he was anticipating a good game against AS Vita.
\n\u201cIt will be a very good game since I know exactly how they play. Vita is a very good side like Mazembe but we can beat them because we are also a good team,\u201d Kamwendo is quoted as saying on Wanderers\u2019 official website.
\nWanderers will be making a return to the competition after 17 years of absence.
\nThey were booted out of the competition by South African side, Mamelodi Sundowns, 5-1 on aggregate.
\nIn a separate interview, Masters Head Coach, Abasi Makawa, described the draw as tough.
\n\u201cEish! Angola? They have very good teams in Angola but we will prepare well for the games and see how we can fair against them,\u201d Makawa said.
\nMasters , who are in danger of dropping to the second-tier this season, have already indicated that they would beef up their squad before taking part in the continental showpiece.
\nSome 56 teams will compete in the Champions League with 53 others playing in the Confederations Cup.
\nBased in Kinshasa, Vita were founded in 1935 and last won the DRC league championship in the 2014-15 season.
\nThe club has won 13 league titles, nine Coupe du Congo and one Super Coupe du Congo titles. They won the Caf Champions League in 1973 and finished as runners-up twice in 1981 and 2014, having participated in the competition 14 times.
\nFrom 2008 to 2010, Vita participated in the Confederations Cup, where they were eliminated in the round of 16, group stages and round of 16.
\nMasters\u2019 opponents, Petroleos, who are based in Luanda, are the Angolan league champions.
\nThey also won the league championship in 2002, 2003 and 2004.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Malawi\u2019s representatives in Confederation of African Football (Caf) competitions, Be Forward Wanderers and Masters Security, have been drawn against relatively tough opponents for the Champions League and the Confederation Cup. The pairings were done yesterday at Caf\u2019s headquarters in Cairo, Egypt, and Wanderers drew AS Vita of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":56077,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57625","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\/57625","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=57625"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57625\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57627,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57625\/revisions\/57627"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56077"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}