NGEZI PLATINUM . . . (0)0
MANIEMA UNION . . . .(0)0
NGEZI Platinum Stars coach Takesure Chiragwi remains confident that his team will progress to the next round of the Caf Champions League campaign after they were held by DR Congo side Maniema Union in a preliminary round first leg encounter in Zambia yesterday.
The Mhondoro-Ngezi based side had to make do with National Heroes Stadium as there are no Caf-approved stadiums in Zimbabwe.
But Chiragwi was hoping that he would have something to defend going into the second leg away in the DRC and now has a difficult task of having to beat their opponents to progress.
It is Ngezi Platinum Star's debut appearance in the Caf Champions League after they won their maiden championship in Zimbabwe last year.
Chiragwi is drawing a lot of positives from the draw against Maniema.
"I think generally the guys did well. First half we didn't give much probably because we didn't know how they were going to come at us. But we came back trying to see how to take advantage by playing a passing game to penetrate and we did that," he said.
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"I think we had a very good second half. We created so many chances that we thought could win us the game. But that is football, we have to take the positives and have to correct the mistakes so that we can go into the second round knowing what we are supposed to do.
"I am very confident we will go there and make sure that we come out with a result.
“With the way we played in the second half I think we have chances to progress to the second round of the competition."
Ngezi Platinum Stars have very little time to come up with a winning formula for the second round, which is scheduled for next Sunday. Yesterday's result is a true reflection of the Zimbabwe champions' recent form on the domestic scene where they have drawn in their last five games.
And against Maniema, Ngezi Platinum played their sixth consecutive draw.
The team will certainly want to to better than in 2017 when they took part in the Caf Confederation where they were knocked out in the first round.
