Analysts have warned that the Flames will continue to struggle in competitions unless there are improvements in squad consistency, game planning, empowerment of local clubs in international competitions and talent export. Football analyst Parry Chinyama and prolific sports journalist Peter Kanjere said this yesterday when asked about their overall assessment of the national football team in 2025, following their stutter in Fifa World Cup Qualifiers, Championship of African Nations (Chan) and Cosafa Cup. In World Cup Qualifiers, the Flames finished fourth in six-team Group H with 13 points from 10 matches, 15 behind leaders Tunisia.
They won only two matches, including a walkover against absentees Equatorial Guinea, and drawn once against Liberia. However, they lost three, including a 1-0 beating by one of the lowest ranked team Sao Tome and Principe. While the Flames are ranked 126, Sao Tome stands at 189.
In Cosafa, Malawi made a bad history by not winning or scoring in three matches but conceded twice. They lost 1-0 to Lesotho and Angola and settled for a goalless draw against Namibia. In Chan, they beat Comoros 2-0 twice.
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They also won 1-0 to South Africa in the first leg before losing 2-0 in the final leg. Said Chinyama: “As a country, we lacked planning for the competitions. We take every competition the same instead of strategising for each in isolation.
Each competition has its own strengths and challenges but we failed to recognise them.” “Another factor is that we are not consistent with our squad. We usually change players for the games, misplace them on positions and, importantly, we have no system of play.” He added that Malawi’s technical capacity is also not impressive as they sometimes fail to read a game, especially, on knowing when to make a substitute or change style of play. Chinyama believes another big problem is the engagement of full-time club coaches.
He said this compromises player selection and brings in biasness in national team call up. He said the frequent change of the technical panel is also to blame because the poor relationship between players and the technical team compromises performances. “Over the years our players have been exposed to a number of coaches, which also has a bearing.
We change technical team so often. We should be asking ourselves why expatriates Tom Saintfiet and Mario Marinica performed better with other national teams when we thought they were not good here,” he said. On his part, Kanjere said the Flames’ struggles should not be surprising as football has a way of exposing those that follow shortcuts and hope for better results without corresponding planning and investment.
“At this stage, let us not be in denial. Accept that we are an average team. Rankings or not, the margins between the so-called small and big teams are now negligible. It is now about who is more organised both on and off the pitch,” he said.
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