Zambia Under-17 women’s national team head coach Carol Kanyemba has attributed her side’s heavy 5-0 defeat to Japan to a lack of composure, timid performances and poor decision-making at the ongoing FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup in Morocco.

The Copper Princesses endured a difficult start to their Group D campaign after conceding five goals against Japan, leaving Zambia bottom of the group following France’s 2-0 victory over Venezuela in the other fixture.

In a post-match reaction, Kanyemba described the result as unexpected, admitting that her players struggled with positioning and decision-making, which ultimately contributed to the heavy loss.

“Very bad results, unexpected. We lost with a lot of goals. That was due to the composure that we lacked. Most of our girls were a bit timid and inferior in decision-making and in positioning, and that really affected us,” she said.

Kanyemba, however, remains confident in the team’s ability to recover, urging the players to strengthen their mental resilience and believe in their abilities ahead of their remaining group matches.

“They just need to build their strength, the mental strength, which we have been working on. They need to believe in themselves. They’re good players, very good players. In fact, if they can believe that they can do it, we can definitely get out of this crisis,” Kanyemba said.

The coach has since urged her players to put the defeat behind them and focus on their remaining fixtures, insisting that Zambia’s campaign is not over.

“Winning is all part of the game, so we just have to make them understand that it’s part of the game and we can always come back from this. It’s not yet over until it’s over. We still have two games, six points that we can get from them,” she said.

Zambia’s next fixture will be on Wednesday against Venezuela, who suffered a 2-0 loss to France. Their last group match will be against France on Saturday.