NATIONAL Under-17 Women team Head Coach Bakari Shime said they will not underestimate Burundi in the upcoming 2020 FIFA Women’s World Cup qualifiers match set for Saturday at the National Stadium in Dar es Salaam.
The two teams meet in the first leg qualifiers as each eye to earn a slot in this year’s World Cup contest to be staged in India from November 2nd to 21st.
It will be the first time for India to host such a high profile football contest which will attract teams from various parts of the world fighting to win the glory.
Speaking on Thursday in Dar es Salaam, Shime said they will approach the game seriously without underrating Burundi describing them as a tough opponent to play against.
“We have had a long term preparation leading to this match and just recently, the team returned from Egypt where we took part in a special competition and this is a good platform to put in practice what we learnt there,” Shime said.
He added that to prove how Burundi are tactically perfect, they are the ones who prevented them from clinching the CECAFA Women title in Uganda last year after coming from behind to force a 3-3 draw.
“Our focus now should be on how to defeat them (Burundi) to stand a chance of playing in the World Cup finals hence it will be a battle between two teams which know each other well as we have met before in various competitions,” he said.
He, however, said football sometimes has painful results as you do not really get what you want but was sure that basing on the level of preparations done so far, they will fight to win the encounter.
Moreover, Shime urged fans to turn up in their big numbers on Sunday to rally behind their team from the start to the last whistle.
“Indeed, supporters play a big role towards helping a team to emerge winners during games. As such, let me use this platform to call for big turnout of people so that together, we should sail to the next phase of the competition,” he said.
A total of 16 teams qualify for the final tournament. In addition to India who qualify automatically as host, 15 other teams qualify from six separate continental competitions.
