AfricaPress-Tanzania: HIGH fever has gripped football fans as traditional rivals Simba and Young Africans meet at Benjamin Mkapa in Dar es Salaam in the tenth round match of the Premier League today.
It will be the first derby of this season for the country’s football heavy weights as mind-game has been the order of the week ahead of their clash.
Heading into today’s derby, Simba’s tactician Sven Vandenbroeck claimed their traditional rivals Yanga are the losing side till now as his boys are favourites to win at any cost.
The Belgian tactician said his side which is currently settled at the third position is looking forward for that challenge as they urgently need three points in order to close the gap with top riders Azam and Yanga who are positioned first and second respectively.
Speaking about the game, Vandenbroeck said this time they are going to face their rivals in a quite different situation compared to their last meeting.
He said their opponents have a different squad and a new technical bench, something he said helped them to be four-point superior to them.
However, he disclosed the situation and atmosphere force his team, to take the game seriously but cautiously as they need three points to make them close the points gap with the top rivals.
He also unveiled that his side will miss the services of their Brazilian defensive midfielder Gerson Fraga and the Rwandese ‘hitman’ Meddie Kagere who have been on injury list for a longtime.
Besides them Simba are going to miss other key players, most notably are their high skilled attacking midfielder, Clatous Chama and the top order striker, Chris Mugalu who are doubtful to play after picking injuries.
There is also Bernard Morrison who has been denied a chance to face his former employer due to injury and the ban slapped to him by the football governing body (TFF).
Also the Belgian coach has as well, cautioned the match official to make sure they managed the game fairly and let the game played in neutral discipline.
Simba’s rivals Yanga, in their report, said they are going to miss the services of their Angolan attacking midfielder Carlos Carlinhos and Haruna Niyonzima, both said to be on injury list, however, despite the fact that the both sides are going to miss their influential players there are unconfirmed reports that some of them might appear in the line-up today as a surprise package.
And this is part of the mind game that has been made public by technical benches of the both sides. The match was previously scheduled to be staged on October 18th before being pushed forward to November 7th.
Yanga’s newly hired Burundian tactician, Cedric Kaze, who will be facing Simba for the first time, said he is looking forward for his first derby victory as he believes he is going to win it despite having a big number of new players in his squad.
