CONGRATULATIONS to coach Honour Janza for qualifying the Chipolopolo to the Equatorial Guinea 2015 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) finals despite a shaky start to the campaign.
Zambia will be among the 15 countries that qualified for the tournament with the hosts, who were disqualified in the preliminary round by CAF for using ineligible player, being the 16th team after replacing Morocco as 2015 hosts.
Champions Nigeria are in shock after missing out on qualification to defend their title along with record winners Egypt who will not be at the competition that starts on January 17 to February 8.
The complete list has Algeria, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cape Verde Islands, Congo Brazzaville, DR Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Equatorial Guinea, Ivory Coast, Mali, Senegal, South Africa, Tunisia and Zambia.
South Africa, in my view, have been impressive under coach Shakes Masaba and so were Guinea, who despite heavily hit by the deadly Ebola virus, defiled odds to qualify against the background of been forced to switch fixtures from Conakry to Casablanca, Morocco.
There is need for Janza to be commended for ensuring the Chipolopolo make a return to Equatorial Guinea where winning the 2012 AFCON title started from. Despite his bold stance when the qualifiers started, Janza eventually took advice to fuse in some fresh leg and do away with some tired legs.
But Janza needs to realise that hard work has now began as he prepares to lead the Chipolopolo to the AFCON finals, a title he won as assistant to Herve Renard, and it is high time he came up with a strong team.
Janza used different players in the qualifiers to come up with a winning team to qualify him to the AFCON finals but will now have the headache of picking the final 23 players to him the job at the AFCON.
Most importantly Janza must decide which players he thinks will do the job for him as he hopes to do better than a group stage exit suffered at the AFCON finals held in South Africa last year.
I feel it would be wise for Janza to leave out some Under-17 and 20 players he has been picking for the training camps to enable them concentrate at their upcoming Africa Junior and Youth Championships next year.
It would be important for Janza, in less than two months, to come up with a balanced squad that can withstand the pressure of playing intense matches at the continental competition about every after three other days.
With draws set to be made on December 3 in Malabo, Janza at-least has an idea of the finalists that have made it to the AFCON finals and can start preparations by securing some friendly matches.
Having picked up three wins on the trot will undoubtedly help the Chipolopolo improve on its rankings ahead of the draws.
Time to prepare should start now as there will be no easy opponents at the finals as seen from the team’s performance during the qualifiers save for the hosts who just sneaked in.
Finally, the Zambian League comes to an end this weekend with Zanaco and Zesco United fighting for the title while Green Buffaloes, Kabwe Warriors, Red Arrows, Nakambala Leopards and Konkola Blades all involved in the relegation battles.
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