Saudi Arabia-based Al Fayha striker Fashion Sakala has spoken out about his performance at the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations.
Sakala, who has been left out of the national team twice in a row by Avram Grant, is one of the players heavily criticized by fans for Zambia’s dominant performance at the tournament, which saw the Chipolopolo Boys eliminated in the group stage after drawing 1-1 with DR Congo and Tanzania before losing 1-0 to Morocco.
Sakala posted a video of his 19th goal in the Saudi Pro League, which comes three days after Grant announced his provisional squad for next month’s 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifiers. He has scored eight consecutive goals in his last eight games for Al Fayha.
However, it appears that some fans commented negatively, prompting the former Rangers FC rapid attacker to respond in the comments section.
“The same AFCON I was playing as a left back and you expected me to score while I was in our box defending the whole 90 minutes.” Sakala wrote in response to fans who said he failed to score at the AFCON. “I have seen you guys talking about my performance at AFCON and there’s no player who performed well there; it doesn’t mean that because others scored, they performed better than me. Noo man, come on.”
“I played first two games at AFCON and we drew both games, I was benched against Morocco very important game and what happened????” he asked.
Sakala is also unhappy that some fans believe the Saudi Pro League is weak, which is why he scores so many goals.
“You talk about Saudi league being weak while all your superstars are here playing against the same teams I’m facing every week, Is it a weak league only for me and it’s a tough league for other superstars who came from premier league?” wondered the former Zambia U-20 AFCON winner.
“I’m not running away from your opinions and I respect that but have some respect man, I put so much hard work in this league for you guys to keep downgrading the work
“What Saudi Arabia has done it’s a big example to the whole Africa, instead of us depending on European leagues we can actually change something and build our own competitive leagues in African countries .
“Don’t downgrade other countries for big investment they’re doing for their countries and we can learn from it and do the same for our country Zambia and the whole African.”
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