YOUNG Africans have described their derby's barren draw with their traditional rivals Simba a good step towards their 28th Premier League title this season.
The Dar es Salaam giants settled their differences at Benjamin Mkapa Stadium in Dar es Salaam over the weekend and shared spoils as none of them pocketed maximum points in the tense encounter.
The outcome was a replica of the first round meeting after they fired blanks in a barren draw hence this season, the scale for the duo is balanced.
However, there is a big possibility for the oldest clubs in the country to stamp a third derby in the semifinals of Azam Sports Federation Cup (ASFC) as Yanga await the winner between Simba against Pamba at the semis.
At a pre-match briefing, Yanga Assistant Coach Cedric Kaze said the results signalled that they have made a good step towards fulfilling their target to grab the league's diadem.
"It is a very good step for us to win the title since we have remained with nine games of which we need to approach with 100 per cent determination, and this begins with Wednesday's encounter against Ruvu Shooting.
He added that his team was better in the first half of the game as they managed to create many scoring opportunities but none of them was profitably utilised to get goals.
"In the final fifteen minutes of the second half, we made a mistake of dropping back to defence thereby; giving our opponents opportunity to come closer to us which was not our plan, but luckily, we could not allow them to punish us," he said.
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His skipper Bakari Mwamnyeto also narrated that the outcome was fair to them as they continue to lead the table with a 13-point gap which he said puts them in the better position to clinch the silverware.
"It was a difficult game worth a derby and we are satisfied with a point we have generated even though a victory could have made us much pleased but we are content with the draw," he said.
On his part, Simba coach Pablo Franco also admitted that the results were advantage for Yanga in their quest to win the league title while insisting that it was a fairly balanced game.
"We are not happy because we have not won and we knew that this was maybe the last opportunity to fight for the league title even though we are determined to fight hard in all our remaining fixtures.
"I would have liked to play under this atmosphere in most of our league matches bearing in mind that some pitches are not such conducive but there is nothing we can do and we are travelling to face Namungo," he said.
The team's Assistant Captain Mohamed Hussein refused to give up on the title chase saying anything can happen on the way as there are more fixtures lined up before the campaign ends.
"We regret not winning because we could have reduced the existing 13-point gap but all in all, we now focus on our next game and hopefully, we are going to do well since the marathon is not yet over," he said.
