Kalisto Pasuwa gave his first interview after the international break and the FCB Nyasa Big Bullets head coach discussed several issues ahead of our trip to Lilongwe.
On Sunday, the People’s Team will face Creck Sporting Club in the TNM Super League at Civo Stadium.
The Zimbabwean provided early team news as he also emphasized Bullets’ need to demonstrate resilience as we prepare to face the newcomers.
Catch up with every word from Pasuwa’s pre-match presser.
On returning from our defeat against Silver Strikers and the break that followed
In football, we have three results. We have a lot of youngsters who are growing up and need to see how a defeat feels like and how you approach your next game when you are coming from a defeat.
Not to say that we like losing but the boys should have to learn the hard part of it. I saw the last game we lost with the situation that was around, even our supporters were very angry. What happened last time will end up affecting the players a lot, so we, the coaches, need to be closer to them and say to them “That’s part of football”.
What we need now is to see how we can wake from slumber. These are the youngsters who did well last year. I have been telling the players that last year everyone was behind them and now you lost one game and things went the negative way. We need to go back and plan ourselves and find out where we lost it, then we correct ourselves and move on.
On how important it is for Bullets to win at Creck
I will say to the team that this is the pressure that we are giving ourselves to say that “we need one result, we need one result”. The boys will be pushing up, at the end of the day we cannot say we lost [to Silver] because we did not want to win. They wanted to win but we missed so many chances. This one again [versus Creck], we are going there expecting to win, and if we get other results, of course, that’s [part of] football.”
On welcoming Chikumbutso Salima and Frank Willard back from injuries
“They are back but remember these guys have been out for so long. Willard was out since last year and he had almost six to seven months without playing football. We need to prepare him well, otherwise, if we take him back [to the playing field] early then he will get injured again. We need to manage these players [when they are] coming from injuries. Chikumbutso also started running, we need to be working with the medical guys for us to bring them to full fitness.
On how familiar he is with Sunday’s opponents
Creck is a team that is just coming into the league, a team that we do not know much about, a team that is full of motivation. We expect one of the toughest games also.
