2022 World Cup qualifier: Top Zimbabwe striker Tino Kadewere out of Ethiopia clash because of injury

Zimbabwe will have to do without striker Tino Kadewere for their key World Cup qualifier in Ethiopia on Tuesday after he was injured in Friday’s draw with South Africa.

Kadewere was one of the top African performers in Ligue 1 last season and expected to be key for his country in their World Cup campaign but had a largely anonymous game at the National Sports Stadium on Friday as the two countries played out a goalless draw.

He had struggled towards the end of last season at Olympique Lyonnais with a tough injury which looks to still be troubling the forward, who went off before the hour mark on Friday to be replaced by Terrence Dzvukamandja.

Zimbabwe departed for Ethiopia on Saturday and have since gone onto Bahir Dar in the north of the country, where they will play Tuesday’s Group G match.

Captain Knowledge Musona said they had disappointed with a disjointed showing against Bafana Bafana in Harare.

“As the captain, I will have to say something to the squad because I know the fans are not happy. We know the fans don’t want us to draw,” he said.

“They expect a win. But we are going to take it from here and try to collect maximum points in the next match. Remember when we played Botswana in the first match of the Afcon qualifiers we drew, but after that we won some games and managed to qualify.

“We still have hope and an opportunity to try and collect maximum points. I know the supporters are not happy with our performance, but I promise that we will do more in the upcoming match. It’s not good enough to draw at home. We need to win, it’s simple as that.”

“We still have five games to play in the qualifiers and we look forward to the next game. We will try to improve what we did wrong. We didn’t create enough chances to score goals. But it is something that we can work on and try to improve,” Musona added.

Source: supersport.com