Cameroon vs Zimbabwe – CHAN kicks off with a thriller
Hosts Cameroon takes on Zimbabwe at Ahmadou Ahidjou Stadium in Yaounde on Saturday 16 January 2021, as the Total African Nations Championship, Cameroon 2020 kicks off in the central African country.
After being rescheduled from April 2020 due to COVID-19 global pandemic, the tournament designed exclusively for footballers who play in their domestic African competitions will kick off, with the group A fixture between hosts Cameroon and the Warriors of Zimbabwe.
The Indomitable Lions play this tournament at home with the sole ambition of winning the title despite a troubled preparation.
The hosts are appearing in CHAN for the fourth time, the mission of Jacques Zoua's comrades is not going to be easy.
For the opening match, the Cameroonians hope to do better than in 2018, winning their first match of the tournament.
The Indomitable Lions coach Mpile Martin said “after several internships, I think we have learned the necessary lessons for CHAN. The adjustments have been made in relation to the warm-up friendly matches and several readjustments have been made."
“Cameroon will try to play a try to win the opening match because in this kind of competition, the most important thing is to win,” he added.
Indomitable Lions striker Jacques Zoua insists the Cameroonian group's ambition in this tournament is to go as far as possible and thus win the trophy. “The friendly matches enabled us to better prepare for the tournament. It helps us even more, especially that we want to win the trophy at home.”
From Zimbabwe side, the preparation disrupted by the Coronavirus pandemic weighs heavily on the foals of Croatian trainer Zdravko Logarusic. "Just 20 hours of preparation before this CHAN," the Warriors manager said.
Zimbabwe is playing its 5th Total CHAN, a shared participation record with DR Congo and Uganda. Despite this experience in this continental tournament, the Warriors have won only three of their previous 15 matches in the competition. Logarusic wants to be a game-changer, even if the first game is against the host country. “We are called The Warriors. We are here to win and to look good despite a disrupted preparation but that does not matter now," concludes Zimbabwe coach.