By Kalumiana Kalumiana
Coach Charles Haalubono defended his decision as to why he risked fielding a second-string team in a critical must-win match yesterday which saw defending champions Zambia fortunately advance to the 2026 COSAFA Women’s Cup semifinals the hard way when they rallied from one-down to beat Eswatini 2-1 in Polokwane.
It was a huge gamble taken by Haalubono in a match they went into Tuesday’s game tied on 4 points with Zimbabwe, knowing very well that only the Group B winners qualify to the semifinals while the runners-up could only do so via a lottery ticket of the best overall runners-up.
“First of all, we are here to prepare the team for WAFCON so we have new players who are coming in for the first time in the national team. So we prepared in such a way that we should give opportunity to everyone to be assessed, so that as we go forward, we are able to make a very good decision on each player’s performance,” Haalubono said.
” So that’s why you saw a big change in this last year, yeah. So it’s part of our assessment. It was quite risky and dangerous, but you know, we have to take risks as coaches.”
And Zambia were made to pay the price when Nonjabuliso Mokgale gave Eswatini the lead in the 15th minute against an untested Zambia lineup that Haalubono had strangely fielded with over half a dozen untested players in his starting XI, minus prominently Eneless Phiri, Avell Chitundu, Susan Banda, Margret Belemu and goalkeeper Hazel Nali.
It took until the 21st minute for Zambia to equalise through defender and captain on the day Agnes Musesa who was playing her first match back in over a year without a call up.
Changes midway through the game with especially the introduction of Chitundu just before the break and Eneless Phiri at the start of the second half saw Zambia stamp their authority on the game which they dominated the entire second half.
Chitundu put Zambia ahead in the 52nd minute with a tap-in to score the goal that would ultimately hand them the 3 points and passage to the semifinals.
Unbeaten Zambia sealed top spot in Group B on 7 points but only on goal difference and were tied with Zimbabwe, whom they beat to the automatic semifinal ticket.
Zimbabwe, who held Zambia to a 0-0 draw on match day two in Group B on Sunday, beat Botswana 1-0 in the other simultaneous kickoff and were by press time awaiting to know if they had done enough to qualify as best group stage runners-up they were vying for with Malawi, who were in Group A action yesterday against Angola.
Zambia will be in Friday’s semifinals, face the winners of today’s three-team Group C, where Madagascar and Mozambique will be in action, tied 3 points together, with Namibia who have completed their allotted preliminary round games.
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