Amid concerns of the poor state of the Kamuzu Stadium artificial turf and closed terraces deemed unsafe for spectators, two Fifa officials on Wednesday visited the facility in Blantyre to assess its condition and work on the next course of action.<\/p>\n
The experts were in the company of several officials, including Football Association of Malawi (Fam) technical director, John Kaputa.<\/p>\n
Fam general secretary, Suzgo Nyirenda, confirmed yesterday that the stadium was under review by the world\u2019s football governing body.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs you know, the installation of the artificial turf is part of the Fifa Goal Project. Therefore, the experts came in to see the condition of the turf,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Nyirenda added that the experts had not yet made any recommendation on the next course of action.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey will give us a report after they finalise everything. It is too early to say anything now,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Surprisingly, stadium supervisor, Charles Mhango, said he was unaware of the experts\u2019 visit and he was not part of the inspection.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just heard that artificial turf experts inspected the stadium. I did not get any official communication. I am not in a better position to comment now,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The condition of the turf installed in 2007 with a lifespan of six to eight years, has been a cause for worry after the turf reached its expiry date.<\/p>\n
Mhango last year said there were signs that the turf was worn out.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery time we are brushing the turf, the grass fibres get broken. The more we brush, the more fibre will be broken,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The inspection comes just before 2018 Fifa World Cup preliminary round draw set for tomorrow in Russia.<\/p>\n
Malawi will participate from the preliminary round and the Kamuzu Stadium is expected to host the games if Fifa approves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Amid concerns of the poor state of the Kamuzu Stadium artificial turf and closed terraces deemed unsafe for spectators, two Fifa officials on Wednesday visited the facility in Blantyre to assess its condition and work on the next course of action. The experts were in the company of several officials, including Football Association of Malawi […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6452,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6447","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\/6447","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=6447"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6447\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6453,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6447\/revisions\/6453"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}