By S. Siapha Mulbah
The West African Football Union (WAFU), Zone A and Liberia’s representation to the maiden edition of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) women Champions League is at an eliminated state following second defeat in row.
Determine Girls who topped the qualifying zone over Senegalese USPA and Malian AS Mande went to the championship to represent the zone and Liberians but faced difficulty in securing a win after two matches.
The girls were firstly defeated by the Zambian champion Green Buffalos FC 4-0 at her debut match on Sunday October 30, 2022 at the Moulay El Hassan in Morocco’s capital Rabat.
Their hopes of making a necessary come back were finally dashed along the way when the Tanzanian women Club, Simba Queens, collected all three points at day two of the match during midweek placing the Liberia champions at the bottom of a table consisting of four teams.
Simba Queens 2-0 win was enough to take Determine Girls to a negative six goals difference that make it impossible to have the WAFU zone champions proceeding to any further stage of the women champions league taking place in Morocco.
With a single match remaining for all teams in the competition, Determine girls will take on AS FAR Club to climax activities at the competition.
Meanwhile Coach Robert Lartey has attributed the challenges of the team to physical huge weaknesses and few injuries that led to the absence of Bountou Sylla in his side forward.
In a pre-match conference, Coach Lartey reported that the absence of Bountou Sylla in the team was a serious setback for the girls despite the presence of Kantie Sayee and Mabinty Camara striking together.
According to him, they went to the competition with lots of injured players who were not fit to take on their opponents. “To admit, we came to this tournament with lot of injured players,” he said.
He added that the CAF Champions league is a very prestigious and big league for the Liberian girls and noted that Determine Girls pace is not enough to advance to another level in the league.
He said “Our girls are very lazy and poor in decision making on the ball. Not too strong to challenge for the ball, no power in their legs to play long balls as the other teams.”
