…..Wander Moreira, Malawi’s Brazilian Mentor, Assembled a Formidable Squad
….Saluting Malawi team that won Silver Medal in Zambia in 1975
By Ndisi Songa
Time flies indeed! It feels like yesterday when the Malawi national football team made its maiden appearance at the 3rd edition of the CECAFA Challenge Cup which Zambia hosted from 31st October to 9th November,1975.
As newcomers and with many not expecting much from the team, Malawi performed wonders by reaching the final and had to play against Kenya.
Malawi was in group B alongside Tanzania and Zanzibar while Kenya, was in group A which had other heavyweights like Uganda and Zambia.
Wander Moreira, Malawi’s Brazilian mentor, assembled a formidable squad that had the likes of Boniface Maganga, Jack Chamangwana, Henry Tewesa, Bosco Munthali, Elywin Mwafulirwa, Montfort Pemba, Frank Mlotchwa, Topsy Msuku, Robert Banda, Damiano Malefula, Spy and Zorro Msiska, Patrick Chikafa, Kinnah Phiri, Yasin Osman, Steven Phiri, Kannock Munde, among others.
Malawi kickstarted its campaign at the tournament with a convincing 3 – 1 win over the defending Champions, Tanzania with dangerman Kinnah Phiri scoring a brace. In the next game, the team played against Zanzibar whom they beat 4 – 2.
Kenya, on the other hand, beat the hosts 2 – 1 in their first game and drew 1 – 1 with their fierce rivals Uganda.
In the semifinal, favourites, Uganda, suffered a 2 -1 defeat at the hands of Malawi while Kenya booked their ticket to the final when they beat Tanzania 3 – 2.
The final was a closely contested encounter with Malawi taking an early lead through Spy ‘Super Header’ Msiska who netted the opener in the 15th minute. Try as Kenya did to equalize, the score was still 1 – 0 in favour of Malawi at half-time break.
It was in the early minutes of the second half when William Ouma equalized for Kenya. Later, Kinnah Phiri put Malawi in the lead again when he scored in the 80th minute.
Towards the end of the game, Kenya was awarded a corner kick which saw Charles Ochieng score with a stunning header. The match, which was later thrown into extra time, saw Kenya win 3 – 2 on penalty shootout and the final score was 5 – 4.
Besides being runners up at the tournament, Malawi’ Kinnah Phiri won the golden boot award.
This was the beginning of better things to come as Malawi went on to win the trophy in 1978. In the following year, Malawi faced Kenya again in a semblance of the 1975 Challenge Cup final which also pitted the two teams.
Malawi beat Kenya 3 – 2 to retain the trophy and this was a sweet revenge of the humiliation that Malawi suffered at the hands of Kenya in 1975 in Zambia.
After 9 years of waiting and searching for the next title, Malawi won the Challenge Cup again in 1988 when they beat Zambia 3 – 1 in a crunch final at a packed Kamuzu stadium in the commercial city of Blantyre.
These were the golden days of football in Malawi when the team was feared in the region. These were the days when football in the country had reached its highest high.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Ndisi Songa is a sports writer, football historian and archivist.
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