Tanzania’s U20 women’s national team head coach Bakari Shime has launched a scathing attack on the quality of the playing surface at the Ulinzi Sports Complex following his side’s 1-0 defeat to Kenya’s Rising Starlets on Saturday.
Despite a balanced affair that seemed destined for a stalemate, Kenya snatched a late victory in the 85th minute through Elizabeth Mideva who gave the hosts a slender advantage heading into the second leg.
However, the post-match talk was dominated not by the scoreline, but by Shime’s critique of the match venue.
The Tanzanian tactician did not mince words, suggesting that the choice of the pitch was a calculated tactical move by Football Kenya Federation (FKF) to neutralize his team’s style of play.
Tanzania U20 coach accuses Kenya of deliberately staging World Cup qualifier on poor pitch
“I want to be honest with Kenyans that you have a lot of work to do. Our approach didn’t really work because we realized inside the first ten minutes that the level of the playing surface wasn’t good,” Shime told reporters at the post-match interview.
Shime further alleged that Kenya has superior facilities but chose the Ulinzi ground specifically for this fixture.
“Kenya’s plan of deliberately taking us to such a pitch worked. This ground should not host a match of this magnitude because Kenya has several other good stadiums.
It is not true that Kenya doesn’t have good fields but they chose to bring us here and it’s fine they won 1-0 but to me my team didn’t play upto it’s level because the pitch was awful.
When we go to the standard pitch at Azam Complex, we are going to win the tie because a 1-0 difference is a very small margin.”
Despite the loss, Shime remained defiant and expressed total confidence that the Tanzanite Queens would overturn the result in the return fixture.
He noted that the 1-0 result was a manageable setback and predicted a completely different game when the teams meet at the Azam Complex in Chamazi
“I’m happy and sure that we are going to overturn this deficit in the second leg. At Chamazi we are going to a good playing surface and as I said before you’ll see what we can offer on the pitch,” he noted.
While the Rising Starlets celebrate the crucial home win, they now face the daunting task of defending that slim lead in Dar es Salaam. The winner of this aggregate tie will advance to the fourth and final round of the FIFA U20 Women’s World Cup qualifiers and will face either of Cameroon or Botswana.
A win or draw of any kind will see the Kenyans progress to the final round while Tanzania hope to overturn the deficit and upset their East African neighbours on home soil.