Author: BENJAMIN BEN
AfricaPress-Tanzania: SIMBA SC said the reason they did not celebrate the title after landing in Dar es Salaam on Thursday was tactical as they want to have double celebrations after defeating Young Africans tomorrow.
The two teams meet in an arguably the biggest East and Central Africa traditional derby slated at the 60,000 capacity National Stadium in the city.
The winner will cruise into the finals of the Azam Sports Federation Cup (ASFC) to face either Namungo FC or Sahare All Stars who play tomorrow in another hot last four game at Mkwakwani Stadium in Tanga.
However, breaking the ice was Simba Chairman Mwina Kaduguda who said it would have been unfair to let the players celebrate while knowing in advance that they have a very tough match coming up.
“As a chairman and a passionate Simba fan, we want to celebrate two things which are winning the title and defeating Yanga and that is what the coach Sven Vandenbroeck recommended to be done. “I totally concur with him because many Simba fans are tired to be defeated by Yanga whose performance is far behind that of Simba hence the coach opted to take players direct to the camp,” Kaduguda said.
He added that him also being a qualified coach, he is aware that no club can allow its players to go for celebrations while knowing that in two-day time, they have a derby match to play.
“These players travelled from Dar es Salaam to Mtwara and thereafter to Lindi and after their game against Namungo on Wednesday, they returned back to Mtwara and had to wake up very early to catch the flight back to Dar es Salaam. “And yet upon arriving in the city, you want the same players to stand on the open vehicle for almost two hours parading the trophy under the scorching sun? Surely, tactically, football is not like that and I am afraid to call that as politics,” he said.
He also said time has come for Simba to migrate from being the old club to the big club saying both Simba and Yanga are not big teams but rather old teams.
“For us, we always have the mindset to be champions while for Yanga, in my opinion, they just think to defeat Simba and not necessary to compete with other big teams on the continent,” said he.
He then conceded that Simba does not celebrate well if they have not defeated their traditional rivals Yanga insisting that they want to break that habit on Sunday (tomorrow).
The champions arrived in the city on Thursday morning and upon landing at Julius Nyerere International Airport (JNIA), there was an open track which was well decorated with red and white colours to be used for parading the trophy but the coach directed his contingent to board the nearby Coaster of the club instead.
