.George Lwandamina

By MOSES CHIMFWEMBE –

ZESCO United head coach George Lwandamina has said his side will settle for nothing less than a victory against Ferroviarrio da Beira to secure qualification to the second round of the 2014 CAF Confederations Cup.
The two sides battled to a barren draw on Sunday heading into this weekend’s return leg match to be played at the Levy Mwanawasa Stadium in Ndola.
Lwandamina, who expressed disappointment with his troop’s failure to score despite created several scoring opportunities, said he was happy with the overall performance of the team.
He said his players have what it takes to reach the group stage of the competition, a target that has been set for the team by sponsors Zesco Limited.
“The team, we all know had a difficult pre-season but I usually do not read much into preseason results, but credit to the players they really dug deep for the performance today (Sunday),” he said.
Lwandamina said in a statement posted on the Zesco United website that the team was focused on winning the second leg at home.
He therefore urged the players learn from the mistakes made during the first leg and build on the good display in order to deliver a positive result at home.
“We were unfortunate to have wasted a lot of opportunities that could have materialised into goals but recording a scoreless draw in the first leg away from home is not a bad result. We have studied their style of play and we are looking at nothing but a win at home in the return leg,” he said.
Lwandamina observed that the players had improved tremendously and that they showed mental strength and high levels of discipline including resilience.
Zesco will have to get an outright victory at home to advance to the next round to face the winners of the tie between Madeama of Ghana or MAS of Morocco.
The Ghanaian side has taken a giant leap in advancing to the second round after recording an emphatic 3-0 home win over the 2011 winners in Tarkwa on Sunday with the return leg in a week’s time set for Fez, Morocco.