It seems we are on the same page on a wider range of issues regarding this team.However my position regarding Kinnah is rather different but we will have to wait and see.As regards going with new players,its a position am comfortable with.It is a gamble but at the same time our professionals have really let us down and if thats the path we need to take so be it.I believe new blood will change the face of the team and provide the much needed swagger that this team has been missing.Only time will tell,lets wait and see.

TK, let me make it clear that I am not against injecting new blood into the team. What I am concerned about is the timing. On the one hand, if the Flames have already thrown in the towel and are building for the future then yes this is the time to try new players. On the other hand, if they are still playing for the Angola spot then they need to stay with the current players until they are out (mathematically).

Yes, newcomers to the international arena need to get a feel for their new surroundings and a friendly match is perfect for this. It gives coaches an opportunity to blood-in new players and get them adapted to international football. However, following a friendly defeat we hear coaches say: “The performance was more important than the result.” Football should be competitive but many friendly matches are played with neither team caring about the result. So, if friendlies are not competitive how do you choose new players? Isn’t that why clubs play a number of friendlies during pre-season? Malawi’s next game is against Guinea on September 5. I don’t know how many friendlies Malawi will play between now and then but if new players will be picked based on the Swaziland friendly alone then we may as well start preparing for the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations. It seems that’s what we are doing because I don’t think this is the time to try new players if we are still fighting for the Angola spot. One of the reasons we lost 5-0 in Ivory Coast is because at least 5 players who played in that game didn’t play in a friendly against Uganda a week before the game. I don’t think our professional players can be likened to the Drogbas, Kanoutes, etc who can arrive only 3 days before a game and still have an impact. Our professional players need to play in friendlies along with the local players. A new formation can look good in training but seeing it in a proper 90-minute match is far more beneficial. If all the players that played against Ivory Coast had also played in the friendly against Uganda may be the Ivory Coast result would have been different. Let’s wait and see how many regular players will play in the friendly against Swaziland. Team cohesion is what is needed. Which team would do better in a competitive match, a team that features its regular players in all 10 friendlies before a competitive match or a team that tries out different players in all 10 friendlies before a competitive match?

If Kinnah has already started building the future team then his position is safe even if Malawi lose the remaining three games. He will have the “inexperienced young players” excuse if the Flames fail to make it to Angola. A man’s got do what a man’s got to do.

As for the goal keeper, I don’t know why he is always in goals. May be he is always at his best in camp. Is it true that the Flames have a goal keeping coach?

J. Kalua, all I know is that the Swazis are preparing for the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations and they want to test themselves by playing against stronger teams. It seems to them Malawi is a stronger team. Speaking of Swaziland, Swaziland´s only stadium was torn apart for lucky charms.

Traditional rituals meant to help teams win their games saw the 600,000-dollar turf ripped up over the month of May so the muti could be planted underneath, with the damage especially bad by the goals and at centrefield.

Is there 24 hour security at Kamuzu Stadium?

Kinnah really doesn’t have much of a choice here.He either can stay with his so called professionals who have not offered any credible muscle to the team,or go with the new blood.Either way the result will be the same but it will atleast expose the young blood and gain them experience.I would also like to see Kinnah seriously look into the goalie issue.If he is prepared to change his striking force,then he might as well start grooming a new goalie.Malawi has been very vulnerable at goals.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMoeDsQe3fk.

ON KINNAH AND ESSAU
As much as I agree that Kinnah was wrong to criticize Essau so openly and wished he had handled it differently,I must say that our players should also mature and rise above such differences for the sake of the team.Kinnah is also a human being like everyone else and so his emmotions carried him overboard.One can clearly understand that a team doesn’t get too many chances to win a game of that magnitude on the road.If Essau missed clear chances,he should have atleast owned up and acted like a professional.Two wrongs don’t make a right.Kinnah probably understood the fact that they had the game in the bank and probably the least he would have settled for would be a draw.Remember when a team loses its the coach who gets the heat.Most of these players will still be around for the next 2-3yrs but will be surprised to see Kinnah coaching this team if the status quo remains the same,a downhill spiral.