By Shamaoma Musonda
and Gwen Chipasula –
GOVERNMENT is delighted with the national futsal team over its qualification to the semi-finals of the ongoing futsal Africa Cup and urged them to push for a world Cup slot.
The top three African countries will qualify to the futsal world Cup to be staged in Colombia this September with Sports Minister Vincent Mwale saying that Zambia can get the just one more win needed to make the World Cup.
He was particularly happy that there was good news coming from a game that was not a football mainstream adding that the performance of the national futsal team at the continental tournament will spur interest from both the fans and sponsors.
He called on FAZ to spare some funding towards the sports and embark on an aggressive programme to all corners of the country.
And national coach coach Augusto Lucio says his focus was now to be among the top three African teams should Zambia qualifies to the World Cup.
Lucio said in an interview after yesterday’s morning training session that the team was in even higher spirit knowing that they were close to taking Zambia to a first ever futsal World Cup.
Zambia qualified to the semi-finals after dramatic night of futsal that saw a power blackout and then Tunisia also looking like going through until a goal at the death leveled for Zambia at 4-4 and took them to the last four.
Zambia finished the group on four points, three behind Mozambique and one more than South Africa and Tunisia.