Zambia Under-23 national team coach Beston Chambeshi has named nine foreign based players for the September 4 Egypt 2019 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier against Congo Brazzaville.
The list is led by inform Fashion Sakala and Patson Daka. Fashion was on target on Saturday for his Belgian Pro League side KV Oostende who managed a 2-1 win over KV Mechelen.His club mate Emmanuel Banda has also been summoned.
Daka was also on target in Austria for Redbull Salzburg in their 6-0 demolition of Flyeralarm Admira Wacker. The 2017 CAF young player of the year came from the bench to score the fourth goal. He also scored a hatrick in midweek in a friendly match. Team mate Enock Mwepu has also been summoned.
Others summoned include Russian based duo of Lameck Banda and Kings Kangwa both of Arsenal Tula, Gampani Lungu of SuperSport United, Bradley Mweene of Pretoria University and Mwiya Malumo (unattached).
Portugal based winger Kenneth Kalunga and Sweden based attacker Edward Chilufya will miss the back to back clashes due to injury. Chambeshi is currently in camp fine tuning 25 local players in Lusaka.
Zambia will play the first leg at home on September 4th at Heroes Stadium while the return leg will be in Pointe Noire on September 8. The tickets for the September 4 tie are already on sale via Computicket in all Shoprite outlets with VIP pegged at K250, WEST at K100 while the rest of the Stadium is going at K20.
The winner over two legs will qualify to the 2019 AFCON that will be hosted by Egypt in November. The top three teams at the tournament will qualify to the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.
Meanwhile am looking forward to seeing Beauty Nachula complete a 400 meter run against Zimbabwe in less than 48 hours as an appetizer for Patson & Co who I expect to finish the Afcon qualification tie at Heroes / is it disaster stadium?