Serengeti Boys to camp abroad

Dar es Salaam. Plans are afoot for the national Under-17 soccer team, Serengeti Boys, to camp abroad for three weeks ahead of the 2017 Africa Youth Championship finals.

Serengeti Boys have been camping in the city for nearly a week now to hone their skills for the finals slated for April in a country yet to be named.

“We are looking at the possibility of camping in Namibia or South Africa but as soon as the logistics are done, we will have a clearer answer,” the TFF youth soccer development committee chairman, Ayoub Nyenzi, said yesterday.

The youth team was booted out of the championship by Congo-Brazzaville last year, but after lodging a complaint over age cheating, all indications now point to the latter’s disqualification.

The Confederation of African Football (Caf) had summoned a Congolese player, Langa-Lesse Bercy, suspected to have altered his birth date, to go to Cairo, Egypt for a Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) test.

However, the Congolese FA defied the Caf directive, which means they have no chance of featuring at the forthcoming finals.

Responding to the situation, TFF has decided to summon the players for residential training as they wait for a communiqué from the African soccer governing body.

Nyenzi said yesterday that Serengeti Boys would step up their preparations for the finals of the continental championship by camping abroad, for they believe Caf will rule in favour of Tanzania.

TFF has unveiled a 35-member squad of the national youth team. New faces in the squad include 15 youngsters who sparkled at the recently concluded Airtel Rising Stars (ARS).

The players are undergoing training at the Karume Memorial Stadium in Dar es Salaam under close supervision of coach Bakari Shime and Youth teams technical advisor, Kim Poulsen.

“We have been following how things unfold about our complaint to Caf and we hope that our prayers are seemingly heard,” an official of TFF, who declined to be named, said.

Also at camp are 20 players who featured for the team in the 2017 Africa Youth Championship qualifying matches.

According to Nyenzi, the team will camp in the city for two weeks before leaving for a country to be named later for further training.

Players who are now at camp are: Goalkeepers; Ramadhan Kabwili (Dar es Salaam), Samwel Brazio (Tanga), Kelvin Deogratius Kayego (Geita) and Anthony Fredy (Mbeya).

Defenders; Kibwana Shomari, Nickson Kibabage (Morogoro), Israel Mwenda (Mwanza), Adam Almas, Gustafa Simon, Rajab Ally (Dar es Salaam), Dickson Nickson Job (Morogoro), Ally Msengi (Mwanza), Issa Makamba (Dodoma), Ramadhan Kawambwa, Shaban Zuberi, Enrick Nkosi and Hassan Kapera (Dar es Salaam).

Midfielders; Mathias Juan, Juma Chikongo, Idrisa Omar, Najim Mussa and Kelvin Naftal (Dar es Salaam) and Ally Hamis Ng’anzi (Mwanza).

Wingers: Asadi Juma (Zanzibar), Mohammed Rashid, Marco Gerald and Abdul Hamis Suleiman (Dar es Salaam) and Jabir Masumbuko ( Morogoro).

Strikers are; Muhsin Malima Makame (Coast Region), Ibrahim Abdallah Ali (Zanzibar), Yohana Oscar Mkomola (Dar es Salaam), Jamal Abdul(Ilala), Boniface Makala (Morogoro), and Hamis Mustafa Mohamed of Kinondoni.