AfricaPress-Tanzania: SIMBA SC skipper John Bocco has predicted that the remaining ten Mainland Premier League matches will be tough for them.
The Premier League’s defending champions and runaway leaders resumed training at the Mo Simba Arena in Bunju, Dar es Salaam on Wednesday, in a readiness for the league restart after almost a ten-week suspension due to Coronavirus outbreak.
Restart date and fixture schedules are yet to be announced by the Tanzania Premier League Board (TPLB), but President Magufuli picked June 1st this year as the official date to resume all sports activities in the country, while insisting that engaging in sports is a reliable preventive measure to combat diseases including the coronavirus.
Simba only need 12 points to win the league title three times on the trot, as they currently sit top of the 20-team pile on 71 points from 28 matches, massive 17 points ahead of the second-placed Azam, who have played the same number of matches.
Young Africans are placed third on the table with 51 points from 27 matches.
With the odds favouring Simba to lift the title, Bocco said they will not be carried away, saying they clearly know that the remaining ten matches will be very tough for them.
“There will be no room for complacency because the remaining matches will certainly be tough for us. We will be facing most teams that are battling to avoid relegation and this presents a tough challenge for us,” he said.
However, Bocco said they have good players enough to face the challenge and amass the required target to win the league.
“We will go out fire blazing for the maximum points in each match and we will always take the match as it comes,” he said, adding that they need time to fully regain match fitness after weeks of individual training.
He believes that playing all remaining matches in Dar es Salaam will somewhat favour teams based in the city compared to those which will be coming from outside Dar es Salaam.
The government picked Dar es Salaam and Mwanza as the two centres to stage three football competitions with the former hosting Mainland Premier League matches and Azam Sports Federation Cup (ASFC), while the latter will play host to First Division League (FDL) and Second Division League (SDL) duels.
In another development, Simba Head Coach Sven Vandenbroeck has called on TPLB to give teams at least three weeks to attend group training before the league resumes.
“We will need build up matches before the league restart because running is not football, so today (Wednesday) we resumed first training with physical test of our players you can see some guys came up good enough but most of them are average. They need to regain their fitness and this will need at least three weeks of a team level training and build up matches,” he said.
The Belgian tactician was impressed by his players’ response to training in the first day, saying as they go ahead; they will quickly regain their fitness levels.
“The mood of players is very good because after two months of no football, everyone is motivated; everyone wants to touch the ball…they are mentally and physically in a good mood,” he said Commenting on the return of attacking midfielder, Miraji Athumani, who was laid off for at least four months due to injuries, Vandenbroeck said the youngster will provide a lot of attacking options for his squad because he can play as the second central striker or attack from the wings.
He said the corona break gave him (Miraji) time to recover and he did a lot of running at the beach which helped him to regain fitness. The coach rated Miraji’s current fitness levels at 80 to 90 per cent.
