Flames’ opponents in the World Cup qualifiers, Namibia, have been plagued by injuries with five key players sidelined for the Malawi game on June 5.

Heini Isaacks, Henrico Botes, Rudolf Bester, Marco van Wyk and Ronald Ketjijere are all injured and were not part of the friendly against Zambia on Saturday.

Brave Warriors coach Roger Palmgren expressed wary ahead of the game against the Flames.

“We just had four training sessions and one game, so it is a short time to see enough for the World Cup qualifiers coming up, but what I saw was mostly positive,” Palmgren told The Namibian.

In regard to his team’s performance against Zambia, Palmgren expressed satisfaction.

“With regards to the stats we had most of the goal chances so we were on top there. Regarding the play I think they had the stronger team while one must also remember that we were forced by the league to change five players after 45 minutes, that was the deal, so that disturbed our rhythm in the second half,” he said.

Flames coach Eddington Ng’onamo, whose side drew against a developmental Zimbabwe side on Saturday, is upbeat about beating Namibia.

“It was not a bad performance as we used home-based players. With the addition of the professional players, we can do well against Namibia,” said Ng’onamo.