Malawi National Football Team coach Kalisto Pasuwa has attributed his side’s 3-1 defeat to Angola to their late arrival at the Estadio 11 de Novembro in Luanda on Tuesday night, which affected their preparations for the match.
Malawi suffered a 3-1 defeat away to Angola, conceding the opening goal just three minutes into the match.
Al Jazira winger Felicio Milson opened the scoring in the third minute before captain Agostinho Paciência doubled Angola’s advantage in the 38th minute.
Two minutes before the break, Malawi were handed a lifeline when Kialonda Gaspar turned the ball into his own net from a Patrick Mwaungulu free kick.
Substitute Dinamo Makhachkala sealed Angola’s first victory in Group B of the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) qualifiers when he scored in the 71st minute, just three minutes after replacing Agostinho.
We arrived late – Pasuwa
Reflecting on the match, Malawi coach Pasuwa said his charges were affected by their late arrival at the stadium, which resulted in their warm-up being cut short.
“A game that we started slowly. We arrived late because I think it was a traffic problem. We couldn’t get in time here, hence maybe our part of warm-up was cut off due to the time that we were supposed to be doing the warm-up.
“But having done that, maybe we tried our best to make the guys warm up in those few minutes that we had been given. But yes, when the game started, we started very slowly. We gave the opposition too much respect. They had too much position in our own half, hence we ended up conceding goals. And most of the time we were defending. And the defending part of it, there was really no pressure on the ball,” said Pasuwa.
Malawi are now third in the group with three points, which they collected against South Sudan. Egypt top the group with four points, the same tally as second-placed Angola.
Pasuwa is optimistic that Malawi will collect points when the two sides meet again in Malawi.
“Remember they will also need to [play] away, they will come to Malawi. So we’ll play our game, and we make sure we get points for us to be at par with the other teams which are on top,” he added.
