Author: SULEIMAN JONGO
AfricaPress-Tanzania: THE national Under-17 Women Soccer team dubbed ‘Twiga Stars’ are in training, beaming confidence to shine at the forthcoming Cosafa Championship to be held at Nelson Mandela Bay in South Africa.
Tanzania Football Federation (TFF) Information officer, Clifford Ndimbo said there are no trial matches outlined so far for the team.
“We have not yet received any suggestion from team coach regarding trial matches,”
“But we will be able to decide when the proposal comes to us,” said Ndimbo.
According to Cosafa’s official website, it is a chance for Tanzania to hold all three COSAFA women’s trophies at the same time, after Under-20 side triumphed in that age group in the tournament that was also staged at the same venue in 2019.
On that occasion that beat Zambia 2-1 in the final and will have given plenty of hope to the senior side and Under-17 girls that they can follow suit.
“ We believe that our girls will triumph at the event,”
“ We thank team coach Bakari Shime for the good technical supervision of the team ahead of the event,” said Ndimbo.
The team are training at Karume Memorial Stadium in Dar es Salaam.
Tanzania will be one of six sides in the Under-17 competition this year, which is to be staged from November 5-13.
The others are hosts South Africa, Botswana, Comoros, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Shime will be keen to make up for the disappointment of the aside’s exit from the 2020 African Under-17 Women’s World Cup qualifying competition in March, when they went down 6-2 on aggregate to the powerful Ugandan side.
The Ugandans are the reigning COSAFA Women’s Under-17 Championship holders after their win in Mauritius last year, but lost the first leg to the Tanzanians 2-1, which shows the quality of Shime’s side.
They could not hold their hosts in the return leg though as Uganda ran out 5-0 winners.
Tanzania had defeated Burundi 6-1 on aggregate in the round before, with ever-dangerous Aisha Masaka grabbing a hat-trick in the first leg.
She also got both goals against Uganda and will be a real threat in Nelson Mandela Bay.
Members of the team in the camp are Najat Abbas, Zubeda Mgunda, Stumai Abdallah, Protasia Mbunda, Ester Mabanza and Vailetha Singano.
Others are Anastazia Katunzi, Emiliana Mdimu, Vaileth Nocholus, Enekia Kasonga, Happy Hezron, Irene Kisisa, Kadosho Shekigenda, Amina Ally, Janeth Christopher, Diana Lucas, Aisha Masaka, Mwanahamis Omary, Opa Clement, Fumukazi Ally, Lucia Abbas, eva Jackson and Philomena Kizima.
The draw for the championships are scheduled to take place Thursday, October 22, at 1000h (0800h GMT) at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium and will be streamed live on COSAFA.TV.
The teams will be split into two pools each containing three sides, who, will play one-another on a round-robin basis. The top two sides in each pool will advance to the semifinals.
