Technical Manager Mandla Mpofu and his team will approach the Sunday Group Two Chibuku Super Cup second match against city rivals Chicken Inn with caution, bearing in mind that the Gamecocks are not pushovers.
The two sides will be facing each other for the first time since 2019, and for the first time ever in a Chibuku Super Cup match.
The last time they faced-off at Barbourfields Stadium Prince Dube and Brian Banda were the stars of the day as they led Bosso to a 2-0 victory with their beautiful second half strikes.
Dube and Banda are no longer part of the club after they joined Azam FC of Tanzania and reigning Zimbabwean Champions FC Platinum respectively.
It was a sweet revenge after Chicken Inn had embarrassed Highlanders 3-0 in the first leg.
However, it is Highlanders who had the last laugh as they also finished the season as Chibuku Super Cup Champions while city rivals only managed to secure second place finish in the Castle Larger Premier Soccer League.
To Mpofu, all that is history.
While he is happy with his team’s preparations so far, he thinks their Sunday opponents deserve to be treated with respect.
“So far we have prepared well. We know Chicken Inn’s intentions, they are a club that is ambitious. They have won something before, they have got their best players, and they have got resources. It is not going to be easy for us, but as Highlanders we can rise to the occasion and make sure that we win it (Sunday match). Of course it’s not going to be easy, it’s going to be tough. We need to dig deeper to come up with a positive result that we want,” he said, addressing the media at the club office.
Mpofu who led his charges to a 1-0 victory against Bulawayo Chiefs in their first Group Two match last Sunday also reflected on the previous match, adding that he wouldn’t have expected his boys to be perfect all round since they just started competitive matches after a very long lay-off.
“I was happy with the performance and the results after the Bulawayo Chiefs game, but of course I will take the positives out of that game. To me these are preseason games, we did not have as many friendlies as we wanted, but of course there is pressure for winning, we need to make sure that we play those games and win. We will have a lot of mistakes coming up as I said, these are preseason (matches), but overall I am happy, we will give each player eligible to play an opportunity to play. You might see changes into this coming game,” said Mpofu.