Chitipa United recount journey, wary of top league action
The newly crowned Northern Region Football Association (NRFA) Simso Inno Build champions Chitipa United have admitted that earning a ticket back into the Super League was not easy as they had to shed off stiff competition.
The side bounces back into the top flight after amassing 25 points from 14 games and had Kadona Stars of Nkhata Bay and Karonga based Baka City breathing down their neck. Coach Nathaniel Mkangama said the championship could have eluded them had it not been for his players’ fighting spirit. The side only lost one game, drawing seven and winning six.
“I applaud my players for the feat. It wasn’t that easy to bounce back but finally here we are,” he said.
However, Mkangama said there is still need to beef up their squad in order to withstand the heat in the top flight. The stiff competition in the premier league didn’t go unnoticed with one of the league sponsors Simso’s Board Chair Abraham Simama saying this is a testimony that the league champions will be a force to reckon with in the super league.
Chitipa United are cruising back into the elite league after being relegated in the 2021 season. They will be occupying a place left by their counterparts Rumphi United who found the going getting tough.
ARGENTINA WINS WOLRD CUP
One of the most exciting World Cup finals of all time has been won on penalties by Argentina after Kylian Mbappe had scored a hat-trick to force the penalty shootout.
Argentina were coasting to victory with an hour gone, the score at 2-0 thanks to goals by Lionel Messi and Angel Di Maria. But when Di Maria came off in the 64th minute the game changed, and France and Mbappe turned the heat.
Messi, has confirmed himself as the greatest player in history, after the greatest final in history, and an occasion that can never be forgotten. He has his first World Cup, Argentina have their third, but only after winning this astonishing and incredible final three times.
It was 3-3 and then 4-1 on penalties over France but those are only a matter of record. What really should be recounted is the emotion, the dramatics, the theatrics, the release, the image of players going to the absolute limit because this is what the World Cup
It only went there, however, because Messi’s great successor in Kylian Mbappe pushed Argentina that far. He became only the second player in a World Cup final after Geoff Hurst to score a hat-trick, to also beat Messi to the golden boot.
As if he will be bothered by that here. It all made it better. To win it the way it had looked like they would for 79 minutes would have been too easy, not epic enough.
Extra reports from Independent Online