THE Warriors received a major boost yesterday after talisman Knowledge Musona was certified fit for the 2014 World Cup qualifier against Guinea in Conakry on Sunday.
REPORT BY TAWANDA TAFIRENYIKA
Warriors coach Klaus-Dieter Pagels and his technical team have been fretting over the fitness of the Germany-based striker. The Hoffenheim striker sat out the training session on Tuesday with a hamstring injury.
But Pagels was a relieved man yesterday after Musona, who has scored two goals for Zimbabwe in the campaign so far, was declared fit by the medical team.
Zimbabwe lost 1-2 to Egypt in Alexandria in March before they were hammered 4-2. Lincoln Zvasiya scored the other goal at the National Sports Stadium on Sunday.
“We have Musona who has been a doubt, but is now fit. We will have another training session where we will work a little bit on the defence.
“And then I think we will be well prepared for this match,” Pagels said after the morning training session.
Warriors had another training session yesterday ahead of their scheduled departure via Senegal this afternoon. The team is scheduled to depart today at 1:30pm and will fly via Johannesburg and arrive in Dakar, Senegal, at 7:30am and arrive in Conakry on Friday morning.
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The German coach said Guinea who mauled Mozambique 6-1 in their meeting in a 2014 World Cup qualifier in Conakry at the weekend had a dangerous attack that includes Bundesliga side VFB Stuttgart striker Ibrahim Traoré, who is well known to Musona.
“I don’t know much about Guinea, but from their 6-1 defeat of Mozambique I gathered that they played with three strikers.
“They also have Traoré (Ibrahim) who plays for VFB Stuttgart and is very dangerous in attack,” Pagels said.
Traoré was one of the goalscorers as Guinea demolished Mozambique. Sadio Diallo and Mohamed Yattara scored a brace each with Mohammed Diarra also weighing in with the other goal to ensure Egypt will have to wait a little longer before confirming their place in the final round of qualifying matches.
The Warriors will be without forwards Khama Billiart and Mathew Rusike who were ruled out of the match owing to injuries.
Zimbabwe are already out of the race for Brazil and are bottom of their group with just a single point while Guinea are placed second in the group with seven points. Egypt lead the group with 12 points with Mozambique second from bottom with two points.
Pagels, however, insists his project is on the right track as he is building a new-look team to compete for a place at the 2015 African Cup of Nations finals while the local- based players in the squad will take part in the Cosafa Castle Cup and the Chan qualifiers next month.
