Cheering on the Chipolopolo

The big match, and the last one of Zambia’s qualification campaign for the 2012 African Nations Finals and we managed to get tickets to see Zambia take on Libya. A win or a draw for Zambia would be good enough to see them through so expectations of qualifying were high. For us the game involved a 1,400km round trip to the Copperbelt as the match was being played in the town of Chingola. It was a lot of kms to cover with not a huge amount to see along the way until we reached the Copperbelt. It was interesting to pass through Zambia’s industrial heartland and see the towns of Ndola, Kitwe and Chingola. Whilst Lusaka is significantly bigger than all of them the city comes across as a maze, whereas the likes of Ndola seemed well planned and welcomed us with tree lined streets, road signs(!) and plenty of greenery.

Back to the footy and the match was being held at the stadium of the Zambian Premiership team, Nchanga Rangers, which had open stands behind both goals and then small covered areas along the sides of the pitch. Supposedly 20,000 people can squeeze in but as a rough estimate maybe 13,000 were watching the game. The fans still generated plenty of noise with their whistles, air horns and vuvuzelas. We fitted in well with our ‘official’ Zambia footy shirts; though official comes in various combinations of red, black, white, green and orange, as well as Nike, Adidas or other brands.

As for the game Zambia played well in the first half, passing the ball around nicely, dominating and creating some good chances. They hit the woodwork three times and the Libyan goalkeeper made a couple of good saves. The second half was much more pedestrian which was strange as we thought Libya needed a win to qualify. We found out later that because of results elsewhere a draw meant both sides would go through. Therefore, the game ended 0-0, the Zambian fans went away disappointed because they wanted goals, whilst the Libyan team celebrated on the pitch (a great achievement given the state of team and the country). I have two abiding memories. First, the warmth and friendliness of the Zambian fans was wonderful as it seemed that some of the post election feelgood factor had spilled over onto the terraces. Second, despite not scoring a goal when their team came close the Zambian fans jumped, screamed, danced and ran around. These celebrations were pretty wild when they hit the post so who knows what they would have done if the team had actually scored!