Lusaka came out the eventual victors in a close fixture against MS Select of New Zealand at the Clough pitches.
In a downpour, MS Select started the brighter of the two sides, forcing a nice diving save from Lusaka goalkeeper Bradley Jr Mweene from a free kick. Matthew Porteus met a free kick from the opposite side of the pitch with a forceful header, but it was straight at Mweene.
Lusaka began to grow into the game with Gideon Miyanda pulling the strings from the centre of midfield. Miyanda put Lawrence Miranzi through on goal, but Miranzi could only roll the ball wide of the left hand post. Lusaka’s next opportunity came through Joseph Ndawa who drove down the left and smashed his effort into the side netting.
It took a moment of brilliance from Miyanda to open the scoring, as he struck a 30-yard effort with the outside of his left foot into the top corner of Sean Dartnall’s goal. Not long after, Lusaka doubled their lead as William Chungu met a corner to head in, despite Dartnell getting a fingertip to the attempt.
Just prior to half time, MS got themselves back into the fixture after a Lusaka defensive mix up left the ball at the feet of Matthew Conroy, who drove the ball into the left hand corner of the goal.
Lusaka continued to cause the MS defence some issues in the second half, with Dartnell being called on to make and excellent double save to first deny Ndawa and then Timothy Chisha with his feet.
MS were able to have some success going forward also, with Aiden Brown having a shot from 40-yards which caused Mweene some issues, but he was able to push the ball onto the top of the net.
Lusaka put the game beyond doubt however when Norris Mwamba spread the ball to Chisha who cut past an MS defender and smashed home via the underside of the crossbar.
@dion_houston