Chronicle Editor
Innocent Kurira
Arenal FC 2-0 Indlovu Iyanyathela
ARENEL FC are now just one win away from gaining promotion into the topflight League following their victory over army side, Indlovu Iyanyathela in a Zifa Southern Region soccer match at White City Stadium yesterday.
Second-placed ZPC Hwange were held to a 1-1 draw by Binga Pirates. With the victory, Arenel moved their points tally to 79 while ZPC are on 65 with 15 points left to play for in the league. Goals from Charlton Siamalonga and Leroy Ndlovu saw the Sweet Makers extend their unbeaten streak in the league to 29 games.
In fact, they are yet to lose a game in this campaign. They have collected a massive 79 points from their 25 wins and four draws. Arenel have scored 67 goals while conceding only three in the process. Arenel coach Kudzayi Mhandire refused to entertain promotion talk.
“We were not that fluent, we didn’t play our usual passing game, maybe largely because they were more on the physical side. We knew that playing soldiers, they would be tough on us hence we didn’t play to our strength today. We had moments where we lost the ball the regularly going forward, we weren’t as fluent as we used to so it was a bit of a tight match.”
Commenting on the championship, he said: “Actually we are subtracting games, we have got five games to go. The championship is something that we have to see through the line and until we cross the line so we are taking each game as it comes. Winning this one isn’t different to when we won against, probably, Zim Saints so we need to keep the consistency and collecting points regularly. I think we would have scored a half a dozen but then we were wasteful in front of goal that’s why I said we weren’t playing our usual game,” said Mhandire.
Arenel finished third last season, behind league winners Hwange and ZPC Hwange. They also managed to book a place in the final of the Wafa Wafa knockout competition which they lost on penalties to Hwange.
The Bulawayo side won the provincial Independence Day Cup in April after getting over Indlovu Iyanyathela.
Results:
Binga Pirates 1-1 ZPC Hwange, Bosso 90 vs Casmyn, Ratanang 3-0 Zim Saints, Mosi Rovers 2-2 CIWU, Indlovu Iyanyathela 0-2 Arenel Movers, Adachi 3-0 Makhandeni Pirates, Jordan Sinnott 0-1 Talen Vision, DRC UTD 1-2 Main Line, Mountain Climbers 0-3 Ajax Hotspurs
Division One Log Week 29
P W D L F A GD PTS
Arenel Movers 29 25 4 0 67 3 64 79
ZPC Hwange 29 19 8 2 42 11 31 65
Talen Vision 29 19 7 3 49 14 35 64
Adachi 29 17 4 8 56 18 38 55
CIWU 29 16 5 8 43 32 11 53
Mainline 29 15 5 8 47 33 14 50
Casmyn 28 12 8 8 34 19 15 44
Bosso90 28 13 4 11 37 27 10 43
Indlovu 27 13 4 10 36 31 5 43
DRC 26 11 7 9 32 26 6 39
Jordan 28 11 6 11 31 38 -7 39
Mosi Rovers 25 10 4 11 35 35 0 35
Ajax Hotspurs 29 7 8 14 30 32 -2 29
Ratanang 28 5 8 15 25 49 -24 23
Binga Pirates 27 6 4 16 31 33 -2 22
M’ntain Climbers 29 5 1 23 16 69 -53 16
Makhandeni 29 2 2 25 8 72 -64 8
Zim Saints 29 0 3 26 7 74 -67 3
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