The Malawi Women’s National Football Team will be itching to make amends when facing Zambia’s Copper Queens in an international friendly match at Reiz Arena in Lusaka, Zambia, today.
The match comes after the Scorchers lost 2-0 on Sunday.
Initially, the friendly match was abandoned on Saturday due to a heavy downpour.
At the time, Zambia were leading 1-0 courtesy of Avell Chitundu’s goal in the 23rd minute.
Scorchers coach Lovemore Fazili said the emphasis was on building a strong team that would be capable of qualifying for the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations finals.
“This is a good match and gives us an opportunity to see if we have made improvements. We conceded goals from set pieces and need to improve on that,” he said.
Fazili said having a full squad was a blessing as he was working on team cohesion.
“Much as we want results, the emphasis is on assessing members of the squad so that we should get good results by qualifying for the continental finals,” he said.
This will be the ninth meeting of the two teams since 2012.
Zambia narrowly edge Malawi, having won four matches against the Scorchers’ three.
The sides drew once.
In the 2024 Cosafa Women’s Championship semifinals, Zambia knocked out Malawi following a 2-0 victory at Isaac Wolfson Stadium in Gqeberha, South Africa.
It was sweet revenge for the Copper Queens as the Scorchers defeated them 2-1 to lift their first ever Cosafa Cup title in 2023.
They also met during the 2021 Women Africa Cup of Nations (Wafcon) qualifiers but Zambia triumphed 3-2 in the second leg after a 1-1 stalemate in the first leg at Bingu National Stadium in Lilongwe.
In 2020, Malawi stunned Zambia 1-0 at the Cosafa Cup.
Malawi also beat Zambia 4-2 in the first leg of the 2012 Wafcon qualifiers but lost the second leg 7-0 in Zambia.
During Sunday’s match, Chitundu gave the Copper Queens the lead in the first half before Rachel Kundananji scored a stunner in the 73rd minute of the match to end.
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