Twiga Stars await draw for Africa finals

THE women national soccer team, Twiga Stars, will on Tuesday learn their opponents when the 7th African Women’s Championship (AWC) South Africa 2010 draw takes place in Ekurhuleni city.

Twiga Stars head coach, Charles Boniface Mkwasa and the Tanzania Women Football Association (TWFA) chairperson Madina Lina Mhando are among delegates expected to grace the event due at 9.30.

Mkwasa and Mhando jetted off on Monday morning and were expected in Madiba land later on the day, ahead of the draw on Tuesday morning. The draw will give the Tanzanian coach the real picture of who they are going to confront in the preliminary rounds and set their final preparations accordingly.

Last weekend, Mkwassa complained that the late release of the fixtures and draw by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) had been affecting the team’s training programmes.

Mkwasa said the fact that they didn’t know which sides they will face in group matches, has given him hard time to make tactical plans because he said, they needed to know their opponents in advance so that they can plan how to tackle them.

The competition, scheduled to take place from October 29 to November 14, this year, will bring together eight nations: Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, Nigeria, Ghana, Algeria, Mali, Tanzania and host South Africa.

The top teams from each group will be in the semi-final before the final. Of the seven competing countries, Mkwasa said they have tips about Cameroon and South Africa, which they have played before and Ghana and Nigeria who have been on television frequently.

But it is definitely that he will keep fingers crossed that they don’t find themselves in one group as hosts Bafana Bafana who inflicted a humiliating 6-0 defeat on Twiga in the friendly match late in July.

“We have not seen Algeria, Senegal, Guinea and defending champions Equatorial Guinea, but we are working around the clock to get their videos so that we could review their game and set our tactical plans well,” he observed.