15 Oct 2019

The Zebras lost 1-0 to The Pharaohs of Egypt in a friendly game played at Borg El-Arab Stadium, yesterday.

Hamdy Fathi, who came in as a substitute in the 53^rd minute, separated the two sides after going into recess with the 0-0 score line.

Zebra’s assistant coach, Letang Kgengwenyane said their opponents punished them due to concentration lapse in the last quarter of the game.

He said their game plan was to contain Egypt, given that they were aware that the Pharaohs would take the game to them.

Kgengwenyane said their research had indicated that the Egyptian football community was not happy with their team’s performance during the 2019 AFCON tournament, where they were eliminated by South Africa.

“So they were under pressure, but we came up with a very good defensive plan coupled with possession, our intention was to play and knock the ball when in possession,” he said.

Furthermore, he said the experience would help the Zebras to compete in the 2021 AFCON qualifies, where Botswana is in Group H with Algeria, Zimbabwe and Zambia.

He said there was a huge improvement in the team, and the game against the Pharaohs had some pointers to learn from.

He said they were currently in Egypt on a training camp, which is a team building exercise to instill coach Adel Amrouche’s philosophy into the players.

“Some of the things we touched on was the training methodology, diet, punctuality for training and to work as a team,” he said.

Furthermore,  Kgwengwenyane said the training camp would bear fruit, given that both the players and the technical team were away from home, hence the concentration level was high.

The assistant coach said moving forward, they should play like warriors for them to perform well during the games, something which he said had been lacking in most Botswana players.

“They now have a fighting spirit, we were using mostly new players, but they fought to contain their opponents,” he said. ENDS