The Malawi National Women Football Team has been invited to the 4-Nation Youngchuan International Tournament scheduled for early next year in China. 

Apart from China, other teams that the Scorchers will compete against are Thailand and Albania.

Football Association of Malawi (FAM) president Fleetwood Haiya confirmed yesterday that they received an invitation from the Chinese Football Association for the Scorchers to participate in the international tournament as a way of preparing for the Fifa Women’s World Cup in Brazil from June 24 to July 25 in 2027.

Haiya said the round-robin four-nation tournament, which China has been hosting since 1998, will give the Scorchers a chance to test themselves against international opposition in the months leading up to the global showpiece.

“As indicated, we are going to make sure that we arrange friendlies for the team ahead of the World Cup against oversees teams to make sure that we are ready,” he said. 

Haiya said FAM has pledged to keep the Women’s National Football Team active by engaging in high-profile preparations ahead of their historic appearance at the Women’s World Cup following their exploits at the recent Women’s African Cup of Nations (Wafcon) finals in Morocco.

The Malawi Women’s Football Team finished as Wafcon silver medalists after losing 3-0 to Cameroon in the final.

Their historic run also earned them qualification for their maiden World Cup finals.  

Scorchers captain Tabitha Chawinga in an interview highlighted that the World Cup is a big stage that requires enough preparations by playing friendlies with world best teams ahead of the global showpiece.

“The World Cup is a big competition, We need to prepare well matches against the best teams,” she said.

Soccer analyst George Chiusiwa has urged the Scorchers’ technical team to take advantage of the international strength testing matches to fix weaknesses in goalkeeping and midfield ahead of the World Cup.