Martha Tembo: From being beaten for playing football to qualifying for the Olympics
By Aaron Mubanga Jnr | May 5, 2020
Women football in Zambia has improved tremendously in the last few years and has seen the senior team making history, booking a place at the 2020 Summer Olympics scheduled for Tokyo next year.
Green Buffaloes Women’s football club stylish left-back Martha Tembo is one of the players from the history-making squad.
The ZamFoot Crew caught up with 22 years old to discuss her career so far both at Club and national level.
Tembo started football from a young age and like many other female footballers, she was playing with boys.
“I used to play football with guys when I was in grade 6 and my school teacher somehow learned of this fact and then decided to start using me for school games. Organized club football I with sport in action before moving to chibloya girls (Now called Nkwazi Queens) and am currently with Green Buffaloes,” she said.
Tembo feels the nature of Women of having menses monthly gives them inconveniences as the cramps come with a lot of uncomfortable symptoms like abdominal bloating, acne, headache, including migraine
irritability, pains, especially backache, low mood, feeling generally emotional or troubled, insomnia and lack of concentration
“Playing football as a woman you go through difficulties such as stomach pains which come naturally and it’s one of the negatives as a woman who plays football.”
Despite all that I am so happy with the growth of Women’s football in Zambia and am glad about my career that God blessed me with. lam thankful for the support I get from my teammates and I was even employed through football after beating Cameroon to qualify to the Olympics for the first time
Martha may be a Copper Queens regular player and employed in the Army due to football today but the journey has not been all smooth.
“My father used to beat me whenever he found me playing football with guys now he supports me his very proud of me,” Tembo told the ZamFoot Crew in an interview.
Tembo is part of the all-conquering Green Buffaloes side that has won the league six times during the reign of FAZ Women’s national representative aspirant Col Priscilla Katoba as President of the club.
Tembo was also one of the key performers for the Zambia Army-sponsored side during the first-ever FAZ Women’s national Championships which they clinched after a 9-0 bashing of Queens Academy in the final at Nkoloma Stadium.