Bliss to blip? How unbeaten but unsuccessful Wanderers are losing the crown before wearing it

Are they losing it? Perhaps too early to say, there are 13 more games to play. One month ago, Mighty Wanderers were basking in glory with a commanding six-point cushion at the summit of the table. However, they had played 13 games while the second-placed FCB Nyasa Big Bullets had played 11 matches with the defending champions, Silver Strikers sitting third, a daunting 10 points behind the leaders.

What has catastrophically unfolded in the last 32 days? The Nomads have been ruthlessly dethroned, now sitting second on the table, a mere point behind Bullets and their once-insurmountable gulf with the Bankers has been brutally slashed to just three points.

If being spectacularly leapfrogged by their bitter neighbors and having their gap with Silver Strikers dramatically reduced isn’t enough to explain the Nomads’ shocking drop in performance, their devastating results should paint the complete picture.

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Is the crushing pressure finally mounting on them? “Not at all, the race for championship is on, we still have so many games to play. We don’t have any pressure, what we have to do is to correct our mistakes and start doing well,” responded coach Bob Mpinganjira after their latest disappointing draw against Creck Sporting Club at Balaka Stadium.

The Blue camp traveled to Rumphi to face Moyale Barracks in seemingly unstoppable form after claiming an impressive 10 wins from their previous 12 matches, they had the golden chance of extending their lead to a massive 8 points ahead of their closest challenger on the title race but instead they were frustratingly held to a goalless stalemate.

Mighty Wanderers have been decent this season but catastrophically not good enough to become the triumphant winners of the TNM Super League title for the first time since 2017. They have scored a paltry 24 goals, a staggering 14 fewer than Bullets, three crucial goals fewer than Silver Strikers. They have won 11 games out of 17 they have played so far, two fewer than rampant Bullets. They hold a modest 17-goal difference, way below their relentless challengers, Bullets who boast a thunderous 29-goal difference.

Only Chitipa United have recorded more draws (7) than Wanderers who have recorded 6, on par with Moyale Barracks, Silver Strikers and Civil Services United. Remarkably, they remain the only team yet to taste bitter defeat this league campaign. But what is the point of maintaining an unbeaten record but failing to dominate the table?

For too long, the narrative surrounding the Mighty Wanderers has been one of heartbreaking unfulfilled potential. A club with a legendary history and a fanatically passionate fanbase, the Nomads were often tragically undone by administrative chaos and an unfortunate tendency to spectacularly falter when it mattered most.

But now, a revolutionary sense of change has swept through the club like wildfire, and the results on the pitch are the most powerful proof that a new, more explosive era has dawned. Will they finally get it done this time around?

Mighty Wanderers have boldly set two ambitious goals this year: conquering the league and triumphantly reaching the group stages of the CAF Confederation Cup.

“As a club, we have set our targets and we want to do our things very differently from how others have been doing,” declared Club’s Chief Executive Officer, Panganani Ndovi during a chat at his office, not a formal interview.

When you enter into Ndovi’s trophy-laden office, gleaming trophies that have been won in his era are strategically placed somewhere and he desperately wants to see the coveted league trophy closer to him daily when he gets into it for work.

“Our core ambition is to absolutely dominate and win the league and I want that massive trophy [Super League] to be there [pointing to the cabinets where there was three trophies, two won by Reserve team and one by senior team.] it is guaranteed that we are playing Confederation Cup this season and we are not just going to participate, our benchmark is to triumphantly qualify for the group stages of the competition,” he added with burning determination.

Their next three matches will dramatically determine their progress to the direction of achieving their lofty targets. Just after the FIFA International Break, Wanderers will embark on a treacherous journey to Lilongwe to face Silver Strikers— a team that they haven’t beaten in their last 8 crushing meetings and the last time they won away was in 2021. In the same crucial week, Bullets will be at home against Dedza Dynamos.

Just after then, Wanderers will face two back-to-back battles in the CAF Confederation Cup against formidable Jwaneng Galaxy, a team which has impressively reached the group stages of the Champions League twice in their last three participations.

But if Mighty Wanderers are not being alarmed by their recent catastrophic performance, then the team itself is alarmingly complacent and/or not ready to win the championship this season yet. They will endure the next two weeks while languishing on number two after being brutally knocked off the top of the table.

Their disappointing draw against Moyale still left them with a 6-point gap with Bullets who were stunned into deafening silence by Blue Eagles at Kamuzu Stadium, thanks to Laurent Banda’s dramatic late winner. But since then, Wanderers have played three frustrating draws against Chitipa United, Civil Services United and most recently, against Creck Sporting Club, beating only Mafco FC by a narrow margin.

Scoring is a MAJOR concern for Wanderers?

Before the commencement of the current campaign, the Nomads aggressively boosted their attacking options by bringing in two promising strikers- Blessings Mwalirino from Karonga United and Promise Kamwendo on free transfer from Dedza Dynamos.

Kamwendo had a spectacular season at Dedza scoring 9 goals while Mwalirino scored less than six goals in the second half of the 2024 season.

Wanderers already had explosive Cameroonian striker, Sama Thierry Tanjong, Clement Nyondo in their custody but their scoring has been woefully inadequate this season. A combination of their four strikers has scored a disappointing 9 goals— Promise Kamwendo has scored four, Mwalirino four, Clement Nyondo one while Tanjong is yet to play a league game after sustaining an injury against Silver Strikers in the Charity Shield Cup.

The team’s current leading scorer is the sensational Wisdom Mpinganjira who is enjoying magnificent form this season, he has scored five goals.

In stark comparisons, Bullets’ lethal leading scorer, Babatunde Adepoju is absolutely dominating the scoring chart with 11 goals, he is being chased closely by his devastating teammate, Chikumbutso Salima who has 8 goals while the third player who has more goals in their team is prolific Wongani Lungu who has scored four.

Defensively, the Nomads do not have major issues currently but any injury to two of their crucial defenders, Stanley Sanudi, Peter Cholopi, or Emmanuel Nyirenda, will be a catastrophic concern. They are the best team defensively, conceding just seven goals in 17 matches.

The team desperately responded to their scoring woes by signing veteran striker, Muhammad Sulumba who made his appearance against Creck Sporting last Wednesday in Balaka.

Bob Mpinganjira frankly admitted that they are having serious problems in converting their chances into goals and he hopes that Sulumba will help them start getting crucial goals.

“The good thing is that we are creating chances. We have to go back to the drawing board to see how we can correct this problem and start getting goals.

“Sulumba is an experienced striker who has played for many teams and in many countries. We wanted a player who can fit easily in our team and also who can help us find goals because we have been creating many chances in many games but we haven’t been scoring many goals. We opted for Sulumba because he already played for us, he is skillful, good physically and also capable of scoring goals,” said Bob Mpinganjira.

The alarming dropping of Wisdom Mpinganjira in form has in one way or another significantly contributed to Wanderers’ dramatic drop-off in performance. The scintillating attacker has been controversially used as a left wing-back in recent games, placing him dangerously far from the penalty box hence marginalizing his explosive potential.

Mighty Wanderers is a team which heavily relies on wing attack and crosses, but they are at the moment desperately missing those expert services that are masterfully done by Stanley Sanudi who is now being restrictively used as right centre-back, marginalizing his devastating attacking ability.

Can migrating from the 3-5-2 formation to any other dynamic formation which will allow Mpinganjira to be closer to the box and Stanley Sanudi to overlap be the ultimate answer to the Nomads’ recent problems?