African U-17 Championship

Today

Burkina Faso  v  Rwanda 6pm
Angola           v  Zimbabwe
Namibia         v  Malawi
Côte d’Ivoire v  Niger
Ghana           v  Gambia
Guinea          v  Benin
Eritrea           v  Cameroon

RWANDA’S U-17 soccer team is up for a daunting task this evening when they take on Burkina Faso in Ouagadougou for a place in the finals of next year’s African U-17 Championship in Algeria.

The Junior Wasps who arrived safely in Ouagadougou on Thursday evening go into today’s(6pm local time) kick-off first leg tie hoping to post a good result ahead of the return leg due in Kigali in a fortnight.

Hardly a month ago, Michael Weiss’s youngsters pulled off a compelling win 6-1 on goals aggregates over Sudan to progress to the final round of the continental qualifiers.

In the build-up to this feat, the junior wasps have been preparing zealously with a series of trial matches in Germany, the last of which were 6-4 and 4-3 losses to Frankfurt 4th league club and another U-19 top Bundesliga team from Frankfurt.

Though they struggled in the two build-ups, Weiss has expressed optimism about his team’s chances this evening.

"We have been in camp for over two weeks and I can say that we are ready for the game. We have identified our weaknesses in the friendly matches we have played and adjustments accordingly,” Weiss said in an e-mail to Times Sport from Ouagadougou.

"Burkina Faso has a strong side judging from their preceding matches in this campaign but we are ready for the challenge,” he added. Elsewhere, Cote d’Ivoire hosts Niger in Abidjan as Cameroon host Eritrea.

In Windhoek, Namibia will square up with Malawi while Angola battles fellow southerners, Zimbabwe. Giant killers, Benin will be seeking for a convincing result against Guinea to confirm edging past reigning World Champions, Nigeria was no fluke.

The Beninese shocked Nigeria 3-2 on aggregate to reach this stage. The second leg matches have been scheduled for November 21-23, with the winners joining Algeria to the 8th African U-17 champions fixed for March 19-April 3, 2009.

Ends