Flames coach Kalisto Pasuwa faced the media at the Bingu National Stadium where he gave his insights on the team’s preparations ahead of a World Cup qualifiers game against Namibia.

The clash is scheduled for tomorrow, Thursday evening at the Bingu National Stadium in Lilongwe.

The Flames go into the match, sitting fourth with six points in Group H whereas the Brave Warriors are second with eight points, both from four matches.

Pasuwa gave an update on the wellbeing of the squad and latest fitness issues, his thoughts on the opponents and the selection of his squad.

Here is everything he had to say:

On how the team is prepared: “We came in to camp a day before yesterday, and we had 16 players, and the other players came in a day after. We had our full training session on Tuesday, which went on very well all the guys were okay and I think in what we saw in terms of physical fitness they are okay and we hope on the tactical part of it they will quickly adjust to it. We will do our training session today (evening) then we wait for tomorrow”.

On facing a much improved side that sits above Flames on standings: “People might take it as one of those small teams but there are no longer small teams in Africa these days, these are teams that will give you problems so that’s the game that we need to put our mind together in order for us maybe to pick up a result, we need to grind everything in front of us in order to come up with results”.

On advantage of having all foreign based players available  “Remember their season is in progress unlike us so it’s good also for us in terms of fitness, if local boys are down these foreign based players can give us a plus in terms of fitness when we are playing. And they are also helpful in technical awareness of football”

On importance of going into the match with four back-to-back clean sheets: “it’s good on our side when you’re building a team you start from the back and we hope maybe when we play tomorrow we will get our full senses so that we must avoid conceding. You know in football anything can happen but our plan firstly is to be solid then we move on maybe to deal with other areas”.

On selecting Ephraim Kondowe over Binwell Katinji: “Remember as coaches, we are given targets on two different tournaments, AFCON and World Cup qualifiers and remember on World Cup qualifiers, so we have plans and for each and every games we are playing”

“On the selection of Ephraim Kondowe, if you look on age difference with Binwell Katinji, Kondowe is young and remember we are also looking at 2027. I am not saying Ephraim is coming to play but he is a player who is learning and see the system that we want to use”

“For Binwell is not bad, he is a good player who gave us what we wanted in his two matches against Comoros and I think in future games he might have a chance to play”.