Veteran Murape Murape returned to training from injury yesterday ahead of Dynamos’ Friday trip to Angola for the second leg of the Caf Confederation Cup football qualifier against InterClube in Luanda.
The two teams played out a dull draw at Rufaro Stadium characterised by the visitors employing a defensive approach which Dynamos failed to breach.
And now the Zimbabwean champions, also welcoming back Derrick Kabwe, should brace themselves for attacking football if they are to make the group stages of the competition.
Timire Mamvura and Devon Chafa, who were both suspended in the first leg, are eligible for this important tie and trained yesterday.
The winner of this fixture qualifies for the mini-league phase of the competition which comes with financial rewards and for Dynamos redemption of lost pride after their 7-1 aggregate loss to Esperance of Tunisia in the Caf Champions League second round earlier this year.
Interclube need an outright win while Dynamos will go through via a scoring draw.
Assistant coach Tonderai Ndiraya said at the team’s training session yesterday that they were expecting their opponents to be as cagey as they were at Rufaro in the first half.
“I think they are going to be cautious maybe for the entire first half as long as we do not score,” said Ndiraya. “In a pound-for-pound contest, we are a better team and if they were to try and attack as much as we will do, we would win that match.
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“I expect them to play with as much caution as they did here and then open up later. For us the task is to try and get a goal early and unsettle them so that they move forward and commit more men into our half.”
Ndiraya noted from the first leg that InterClube are difficult to break down because of their tactical discipline.
“They are physically well conditioned and they showed in the first leg that they have tactical discipline, we will need to be at our attacking best. They were very defensive in the first leg as they had eight players behind the ball most of the time and they made life difficult for us.
“We learnt a lot from that first leg which is going to be useful going into this match. We are a big club and we are well aware how tough it is playing away from home, but we are confident about our chances. This campaign is definitely not yet over.”
For once in this African safari, Dynamos have a clean bill of health and there are no suspensions to worry about.
All the players registered in continental competitions trained yesterday save for Takesure Chinyama who sat out part of the training as a precautionary measure.
Only Denver Mukamba, who is finalising his move to Wits, was missing from the group, but the coaches said they were yet to receive official communication about his unavailability for this match.
InterClube play at the 12 000-capacity Estádio 22 de Junho and are likely to be all out on attack from the start in a bid to unsettle the visitors.
