Primary Interhouse Arts afternoon

How do you play a classical piece with no instruments and no trained musicians?!
You create an ‘Air Orchestra’!
Following the fun of last year’s arts afternoon, we organised a musical competition between the 3 houses again. This year the group performance song was our school song ‘Wisdom Seekers’; the children had been learning it in their music lessons. Following that each house performed to Saint-Saëns Carnival of the animals Fossils music. Before the performance, the children listened to the music, identified the instruments, were organised into sections and practised!
Each house performed in front of our judges Mrs Towse and Miss Lydia. Children were scored on their musical diction when singing; organisation and interpretation of the music; were the instruments recognisable? and the house’s enthusiasm and enjoyment.
Musenga and Luano were joint winners with Kasompe in third place.

Reported by Mrs Kirk

Mrs Towse and Miss Lydia

Football Nationals U19

On Friday the 20th of March the U-19 boys football team traveled down to Lusaka to play in the ISAZ finals. It was a competition that consisted of the four best teams from Copperbelt (including Amano) competing against the four best teams from Lusaka. They split us up into two groups, and in our group we had Lake Road, Chengelo and American International School of Lusaka (AISL). The top two from each group would go on to the semi-finals to then compete for the trophy.
Our first game was against Lake Road, who we hadn't played in a long time and so didn't know what to expect, but that didn't effect our performance and we ended up winning that game 5-1, with James getting a hat-rick as well as Seth and Edwin getting a goal each. This was all due to the hard work we put in as well as the fact that we played really well as a team. Our next game was against Chengelo (who we had previously beaten 3-0 in qualifying), we knew this wasn't going to be an easy game as they changed their formation completely and where really tight on our top two as well as playing with a sweeper. We managed to score in that game but unfortunately it was disallowed because of a handball. We drew that game 0-0, which meant in order to come in the top two we simply couldn't lose our last game against AISL. We went into that game considerably confident but we gave away an early goal. This more or less threw our structure out of the window as we scrambled to try and get a goal that never came. So overall we came third in our group which meant we weren't able to qualify for the semi-finals but, all in all, I think it was an amazing experience for most of us, we played our hardest and that’s the most important thing even though it wasn't enough.

James was the Man of the Match for me seeing he scored a hat trick.

By Edwin Dingwall

ISAZ Cross Country

On Friday [27th February] we had cross country at Amano for the under 19 boys and the schools that came were Lifesong, Emma’s kids, Lechwe, Ndola Trust, Simba and Amano. Amano fielded three boys teams Amano A,  Amano B and Amano C. Before we started the race the weather was not friendly; it was raining hard and the ground became slippery but we thanked God that the rain stopped. We were a bit nervous because we have never raced Lifesong and Emma’s kids before but we knew that we could do it. We started the race and there were lots of people at the starting point. The hardest part of the race was the swampy area and the stony uphill paths. After the race they added the points and Amano A came first but there was lots of competition and its was nice to see some guys putting a lot of effort and work into the race even though it was extremely tough. Thanks to the people who were supporting us and a big thanks as well to Mr and Mrs Grove and the teachers. 

Reported by Sani Banda

Junior race

Note from staff:

Amano invited two orphanages to take part in the event. Lifesong and Emma's are both Kitwe based orphanages and have schools attached to them. There connection with the Amano is current and past students from these institutions. They were extremely good runners and came first overall and so deserve a recognition here for their work. They are not part of ISAZ which is why the captain's reports states Amano was first. This is reference to the ISAZ trophy. It was good to have visitors to raise the standard of competition. Also noteworthy is that despite this increase in competition Sani was still able to come first place with an excellent effort. Well done.

Mr S Grove

The swampy area

Secondary race

Sani being interviewed by Zambian TV

FQM Rugby 7’s Tournament

Saturday 28th of February, the Amano Rugby team took part in the First Quantum Mining 7’s tournament; hosted by Simba School. There were 9 other schools present which was a mixture of both ISAZ and Government schools. As there were so many schools the teams were split into two groups, each consisting of 5 teams. In our pool Amano faced Kansenshi, Chiwala, Mpelembe and Trident. Each game lasted 10 minutes with 5 minute halves.
Our first game was yet again against Mpelembe. It was a fairly even game, but unlike last time we managed to draw 7 all. Our next game was Trident, they were in shape both strategically and physically and because of this they managed to score an extremely early try putting them in the lead. Amano managed to fight back and score against them but unfortunately, Trident scored a late try from a tap-kick penalty and we lost the game 11-6.

Front 3 L-R: James, Joshua and Caleb

As a team this made us come together and realize our mistakes. Our next two games were against Chiwala and Kansenshi. We were able to capitalize off of our advantages, these being fitness and speed. We beat Chiwala 10-0 and Kansenshi 18-0. However, I would like to mention that in our last game against Kansenshi they gave us a run for our money as the game turned fierce and additionally physical in the last few moments.

James scoring against Kansenshi

The two wins, 1 draw and a loss, managed to put us through to the plate final, for third place. We were to face Chifubu nicknamed the ‘all blacks’ after the New Zealand team and their all black kit. This was our toughest game of the tournament as we had to really fight for the plate. Chifubu also managed another early try because of poor defence and the team being half asleep. We fought back with all we had and scored two tries with the addition of a conversion. This gave us the lead and we won that game 11-10. [All kicks at goal only scored 1 point]

3rd place Plate Winners

What I can say about the tournament is that it was much more difficult than the previous ISAZ sevens. In light of there being 10 teams taking part some of the boys we played were possibly over age. I did see some of our boys really shine during the tournament, Andy and James in particular as well as Joshua going straight for the older lads. But I can only pick one player of the tournament and that would be Andy Chonde.

Andy making a nuisance of himself

The team came 3rd out of 10 schools. With Trident taking 1st place and Simba 2nd place. So with that said I would like to say ‘thanks’ to the team for their effort, Mr. Grove for coaching us and a massive thank you to God for enabling us to play such a game and for allowing us to go that far.

Reported by Ethan Milner



An additional thanks goes to First Quantum Mining Company and Tag Trust UK for sponsoring the event with prizes, referees and food. We are very grateful. Well done boys especially as you had run and won the Inter-school Cross country the day before. An excellent achievement.
Mr S Grove

Football Regionals U19

On Friday the 6th of March the U-19 boys football team went to Chengelo to compete against other Copperbelt schools in order to see who would go to Lusaka to represent the Copperbelt region. We were put into two pools; in our group we had Ndola Trust, Mpelembe and Simba. In the other group were Trident (who recently just joined ISAZ), Chengelo, Kalulushi Trust, Nsansa and Lechwe.

Our first game was against Ndola Trust and we took a very early lead through Edwin, possibly even with our first attack. But unfortunately that did more harm than good to us as we ended up losing that game 4-1. It was a very demoralising first game but the most important thing is we tried to improve on our mistakes and went into the Mpelembe game almost a whole different team. We ended up beating them 3-1 with two goals by James and one by his brother Paul. We let in an easy goal but the most important thing was that we put in a good performance and actually won! J  Our next game was against Simba, this was a game that if we wanted even the slightest chance of going through to Lusaka, we had to win. We played really hard in that game continuing our good performance from the previous game; we ended up 3-1 with Paul getting a hat-rick. Mpelembe had beat Ndola Trust 1-0 in the other game which meant we were all [three teams] on six points as well as having the same goal difference! After a long anxious wait [Just before bed time] we got the news that we went through, based on the fact that we had beaten them [Mpelembe] 3-1 in our game [Head-to-head tie breaker]. This meant that we were to play Chengelo, the hosts, in the semi finals [the next day] who, in the group stage, hadn't lost a game.

 Seeing as they where the hosts they had the upper hand when it came to support. But that didn't stop us, we played a really high intensity game, closing them down at every corner of the pitch, we eventually won that game 3-0 with Paul getting his second hat trick of the tournament. This meant we were in the finals for the first time in at least five years. We were to face Ndola Trust yet again. We went in that game daring not to have the same outcome. We eventually ended the day on a sad note losing 1-0, but all in all, it was a great weekend for the boys, an amazing experience and a very interesting drive back too having broken down [four flat tryes] at least three times.

The Man of the Match for me was Paul.

By Edwin Dingwall.