•MULENGA

By GWEN CHIPASULA –

SOUTH African based midfielder Mukuka Mulenga says Zambia needs to beat Nigeria on Sunday and qualify to the All Africa Games (AAG) finals to be held in Congo Brazzaville.
Mulenga, who missed Zambia’s 0-0 match against Nigeria in Abuja, said the Under-23 team needs to win the match and qualify as a way of compensating failure by other teams to perform well and international stage.
The former Power Dynamos player, who joined camp on Tuesday, said he was confident that Zambia will produce a good result in Sunday’s second leg qualifying game against Nigeria.
Mukuka said he has happy that his club Bloemfontein Celtic released him to join the team because of lack commitments this weekend in the South African PSL.
“I need to contribute fully to the teams’ success and that is why I am here, and to also help boost and teach the other guys,” he said.
He said the match will be important because Nigeria will also be coming to Zambia with the aim of winning especially that the winner automatically clinches a place at the September finals.
Coach Simukonda said he was still expecting the Israel duo of striker Evans Kangwa and Emmanuel Mbola to join the squad today.
This is despite Football Association of Zambia (FAZ) communications manager, Nkweto Tembwe on Tuesday saying that Kangwa would miss the crunch tie due to communications problems in securing his release.
Simukonda said he was not aware of Kangwa missing the game because he had not been communicated to and insisted that the player was still in his plans.
Striker Ronald ‘Sate Sate’ Kambamba also joined the team on Wednesday along with Mukuka.
Meanwhile, Mukuka expressed happiness with his loan deal at Celtics from Mamelodi Sundowns.
He said he would use the experience gained at Celtic to fight for a place at Sundowns