Warriors’ coach Michael Nees says he wants to progress to the second round of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) in Morocco next year after he helped Zimbabwe bounce back to the continental championship with a solid 1-1 draw against Kenya at Peter Mokaba Stadium in Polokwane on Friday.
Scotland-based winger Tawanda Maswanhise gave the Warriors a first half lead beating Kenya goalkeeper Bryne Odhiambo from the edge of the box before Jonah Ayunga bundled home the equaliser early in the second half following a rare mistake at the back.
The result meant that the Warriors grabbed the second and final Group J Afcon ticket to join log leaders Cameroon.
Zimbabwe will be making a return to the Africa safari for the first time since 2021 after missing out on the qualifiers for the 2023 event due to a Fifa ban.
Nees believes the Warriors will not be in Morocco just to make up the numbers.
“With regard to the Afcon finals’ objective, if you are there you want to get to the second round. You don’t want to go there just to be there and train five or six times in the tournament and then have three matches and go home. But I think that goes for every team, which participates but the competition is still very far,” the 57-year-old German told reporters after the Kenya tie.
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“You don’t know if the players can keep their shape, their fitness and maybe one can get badly injured. It’s too far and it’s a bit unique I must also say because normally a tournament should be three months or four months after the qualification and not over a year. But the calendar could not make it possible in another way so we have to accept this. It gives us time to work on things,” Nees added.
The 35th edition of the biennial African football tournament is set to run from December 21, 2025 to January 18, 2026 in Morocco.
While he is not complaining Nees felt the qualification was too congested with fixtures for a tournament that is still more than a year away.
“It’s strange and the whole qualification process was very condensed. Imagine a key player gets injured and is completely out of the qualifiers. It was a challenging qualification race. When you lose you cannot rectify things. The calendar is fully packed and you have no time to train. When we play in Cameroon I can tell you that we have only one session; 60 minutes in the stadium that's all and the rest is travelling
“But I must also say it gives us time to prepare. We were under a lot of time pressure, which was a big challenge when I came here especially with the staff I have never worked with. I must complement all the technical staff and everyone involved for pulling in one direction,” he said.
Zimbabwe managed to qualify for the Afcon finals with their unbeaten record intact and play five-time African champions Cameroon at Ahmadou Ahidjo Stadium in Yaoundé, on Tuesday in the final group game.
The Zimbabwean coach reckons the objective is to beat Cameroon and help the country’s world ranking while maintaining the team’s unbeaten run in the qualifiers.
“You need to take every game very seriously because it counts on Fifa rankings and the better your Fifa ranking, the better your seeding in the next tournament so it has consequences. We have not lost a game in the last five matches and we want to continue like that," Nees said.
“But I must also look at the players, how they are because I am sure three or four may not have recovered and I must see how we can assemble a squad, which can face Cameroon and also considering that a few other players also deserve a chance. But then if we lose you guys (the media) will complain that the team is not so good so we need to find the balance. We want to get a result but we must be cautious on other things.”
For the Cameroon match Zimbabwe will be missing the services of defender Gerald Takwara, who was stretchered off during the Kenya games after he was injured attempting to clear the low cross which led to the Harambee Stars’ equaliser.
The Warriors technical team has also released vice-captain Marshall Munetsi who was a target of crude tackles as a precautionary measure.
A win for Zimbabwe will see them finish the qualifiers as Group J winners while it will be their first win over Cameroon in that country.