Nigeria win wasn't 'luck': How Ascent Soccer is transforming women's football in Malawi

The academy, founded in 2015 in Lilongwe, has become the country’s true talent factory, now better known for its female stars like the Chawinga sisters than for its men’s football. Its co-founder, George Maguire, looks back on 10 years of a bold gamble.

The story of Ascent Soccer didn’t begin with a carefully planned project to develop Malawian football. It started in 2008, when Maguire, a young Englishman who had come through the youth systems at Bristol City and Southampton, moved to Malawi to run a football and netball tournament sponsored by his father’s agricultural company.

"There were no academies, no youth development," he recalls of that time. The tournament reached 5,300 schools and 50,000 students across the country. It was there, during the regional and national finals, that Maguire saw raw potential - completely untapped.

The question that obsessed him was simple: why do Malawi, Zimbabwe, or Zambia never produce players who make it to the top leagues, unlike Ivory Coast or Senegal? His answer, after some research: a total lack of infrastructure.

"Clubs have no money. There are no academies, no youth training."

From this realisation, Ascent Soccer was born in 2015, with very limited resources. "We started with 300 pounds and 10 balls, nothing else, but a lot of motivation," Maguire sums up.

Notably, the choice of location was not strategic. "Honestly, if you wanted to be strategic about where to set up a football academy, you'd probably have gone to Zambia rather than Malawi in 2013. The economy is more stable there, and the talent pool is potentially better on paper."

But that’s where Maguire lived, where his father was building his business, and so the academy was born there - almost by geographic accident.

Today, Ascent Soccer is built on five pillars: football, education (through a STEAM programme), gender equity, ecology (the academy claims to be the greenest campus in sub-Saharan Africa, fully powered by solar energy), and community development. The new 10-hectare campus, fully operational since January 2025, hosts 80 full-time boarders.

An unexpected shift

What makes the Malawian case unique is that its first visible figures in Europe are women players - the two sisters Tabitha and Temwa Chawinga - not men.

Maguire has a clear explanation for this phenomenon, which he finds almost counterintuitive: "I think women’s football is developing very quickly, but overall it’s still less developed than the men’s game. That made it easier for us to bring players up to the level where Europe would offer them contracts."

According to him, the investment gap in European men’s football over the past 15 years has made the step up too high for players trained only in Africa, outside of major pathways like Right to Dream. 

"If you look at the Premier League, the two most valuable African players who were trained in Africa came through Right to Dream, with European-level investment. Ten or 15 years ago, locally trained African players like Didier Drogba or the Toure brothers could still reach that level without it. It’s not that the talent has changed, it’s that the level of expectation in Europe has skyrocketed."

On the women’s side, that ceiling hasn’t risen as high yet, simply because there hasn’t been as much money poured into European women’s football.

"That leaves room for African talent - very athletic, very aggressive, bringing a physical intensity that some European players don’t yet have."

Maguire seems almost amused by this dynamic: "I think it’s a great story that the two most famous personalities in Malawian football are women. It’s really interesting."

Struggle to find talent

Maguire emphasises the initial imbalance between girls and boys when launching the women’s programme. 

"There’s no professional league in Malawi. Women aren’t paid to play, even at the top level." The national women’s league has only existed for a year; before that, there were just three regional leagues.

When Ascent Soccer signed its first female player in 2017, the mission was almost impossible: "We could hardly find any talented young players. There were so few teams that if you were a good 13- or 14-year-old, you were already playing at the senior level, in a football environment that wasn't exactly safe for players of that age."

With no clear talent pool, the academy even asked its own boys if they knew any good girl players at their schools. That’s how a 10-year-old goalkeeper mentioned a classmate he thought was especially gifted. Her name was Ireen Khumalo.

She officially became the academy’s very first female recruit, and years later started as left-back against Nigeria. She now plays for Silver Strikers Ladies, a club in Malawi.

Cultural resistance is strong, even more so than on the men’s side. "There are cultural barriers to girls’ participation, especially in a fairly conservative African culture about showing your legs in public, and parents who say football will get their daughter nowhere, that she should be in school or stay home to help," admits Ascent’s co-founder.

Maguire tells the story of Melicy Lickson, the academy’s second female recruit, a former U17 and U20 international and now an academy employee, who had to lie to her mother about going to training, or risk being banned outright.

Tailored recruitment for a sprawling country

Malawi stretches north to south over about 10 hours by road, divided into three regions. Ascent Soccer, based in Lilongwe, organises a week of scouting in the north, a week in the south, and ongoing work in the central region where its campus is located.

The process has several stages: open tournaments in the most densely populated areas, then a selection day for the most promising youngsters, including unconventional cognitive tests (pattern recognition, logical sequences) rather than standard school exams. 

"Malawi is the fifth poorest country in the world," Maguire points out. "In public schools, classes average about a hundred students. Only 12% of the population finishes secondary school, 1% goes to university."

In this context, the academy assesses potential rather than acquired level.

The selected girls are then invited to a residential week called National Trials, often their very first time leaving their home region. "Some arrive without boots, some without a toothbrush. It’s hard for us in the West to understand these challenges.

"That’s also why we’re so proud of the girls playing in the Africa Cup of Nations today: people will see the result on the field, but for Malawi, beating Nigeria is even more incredible than you’d think, because of what these players have been through. So yes, the result against Nigeria was a surprise, but it wasn’t luck."

Convincing families is, according to Maguire, much more difficult for girls than for boys. "We’re asking parents to entrust us with their daughter, sometimes two, three, four hours away by road."

The academy explains how it works, its supervision ratio, how the boarders are cared for daily, and organises campus visits for families or for a relative living in the capital if the parents themselves can’t travel.

"Some parents don’t dare ask anything and just send their daughter straight to us. You think: would I do that with my own daughter? Probably not."

The case of Lughano Nyondo, who signed very young for an American university where she studies environmental science and now plays in the college league with the Northeastern Huskies, illustrates how tough these conversations can be.

"It was the hardest parental conversation we’ve ever had. The family brought in uncles and aunts, a real committee in the room, two solid hours of discussion, then they asked for a weekend to think it over."

Maguire notes, however, that these discussions are getting easier as the academy’s reputation grows in the communities: "What happened to Faith, to Rose, to the Chawinga sisters, to Lughano, all of that is now well known and publicised in Malawi. A result like the one against Nigeria only makes these conversations easier."

Once admitted, the players receive comprehensive, free support, with no option to pay to join the programme: accommodation, food, medical care, equipment, schooling through the end of secondary school. 

"We’re not for profit. It’s free, we don’t charge anyone. You can’t buy your way into Ascent Soccer either - you have to be selected."

Mixed training

One of the academy’s most unique methodological choices is mixed training groups - girls and boys together - based not just on age but also on physical profile. 

"We believe that the more girls are exposed to fast, technical football, the faster they develop. We’ve tested mixed groups in several weekly sessions and the improvement among the girls is clear."

The logic: the boys’ game, which is faster in Malawi, prepares the girls to handle pressure and speed, giving them a real head start in their development.

"If they can handle that against boys, then when they play against girls, the intensity feels lower." This setup is balanced with single-gender sessions for well-rounded development, and it’s common for girls to outperform boys in these mixed trainings.

Maguire sees this as a cultural as well as a sporting benefit: "It’s a great message to send to the boys. It’s not just ‘I got dribbled by that winger’ - it’s been really positive for our environment."

Tactically, the academy claims an open but deliberately flexible playing style, in contrast to the big European academies.

"We want to play attacking football, be quick in transitions, move the ball on the ground, and give players responsibility in their decision-making."

Maguire is clear that he doesn’t want to "coach out" the improvisation and dribbling that, in his view, sets locally trained African talent apart: "If we just do what Bayern or Arsenal do, imposing a set playing style, we’ll only ever be a lesser version of them."

The Chawinga shockwave

You can’t talk about Malawian women’s football without mentioning the Chawinga sisters, Tabitha and Temwa, with the elder now playing for OL Lyonnes.

Maguire played a direct role in Tabitha’s rise even before the academy was founded. In 2013, while running a football tourism company called African Football Tours, three Londoners asked him to organise a trip focused on women’s football. 

The group attended a DD Sunshine training session (now part of Silver Strikers), where a certain Tabitha, then 17, was playing. "She was on a completely different level from everyone around her."

When asked, the player said she already had four caps and nine goals for the national team, with no one helping her get noticed. Maguire filmed Tabitha at training. "I honestly didn’t think the video would work. It’s probably the worst video that ever got a player a move."

A few months later, a Swedish club got in touch. That set her on a path that would take her to China and then Europe. A twist of fate: when that same Swedish club let Tabitha go, they replaced her... with her sister Temwa.

For Maguire, the impact of the two sisters goes far beyond football: "They showed that a career in women’s football is possible, and that’s changing attitudes across society about what football can offer a girl. And they’ve inspired a whole generation."

He mentions Lughano or Victoria Mkwala, now Ascent Soccer players, who admired Tabitha at 11 or 12 without knowing they’d one day play alongside her for the national team. "It’s a beautiful passing of the torch."

Historic achievement

Malawi’s qualifying campaign for the 2026 Africa Cup of Nations can be summed up in one image: the two goals by Faith Chinzimu against Angola, which sent the Malawian women’s team to the Africa Cup of Nations for the first time ever.

Trained at Ascent Soccer before joining Hacken in Sweden, Faith has become one of the rising stars of this generation. 

The tournament draw - with Zambia, Nigeria, and Egypt in Malawi’s group - was daunting. 

"Everyone in Malawi thought: oh no, for their first tournament, couldn’t we have had an easier match?" says Maguire, who highlights the local rivalry with Zambia, which has already played in a World Cup and Olympics, while Malawi feels behind its neighbour.

A 3-2 friendly win over Zambia last year, with a goal from Tabitha Chawinga in the rain in Lusaka, had raised hopes. 

Despite the scale of the challenge, Maguire’s conviction remains strong: "We’ve always thought Malawi just needs to go out and score more goals than the opponent. Malawi will concede goals, but its attack is strong. I don’t think anyone wants to face this front line. No one wants to go up against Tabitha and Temwa, that’s for sure."

Of the 11 players who started against Nigeria, four were trained by Ascent Soccer: Leticia Chinyamula in midfield, alongside Chinzimu before her move to Hacken, Rose Kadzere on the left, and Maggie Chavula on the bench.

Khumalo, the very first player ever recruited by the club, rounds out this Ascent core in the Malawian squad. In total, at major youth tournaments, the academy alone supplies five or six players to the country’s U15, U17, and U20 teams. "We are the biggest talent pipeline to the national teams at youth level," Maguire says proudly.

The Montpellier pioneer

The name that comes up most often in Maguire’s story is Kadzere, now a starter at Montpellier, where she became the first Malawian player - male or female - to join one of Europe’s top five leagues directly.

Her journey was marked by the Covid-19 pandemic, which interrupted her progress for a year and a half. "Rose came from a very poor background, a tough childhood, limited access to nutrition, a difficult start."

Education was a challenge in itself: "She wasn’t really going to school when we signed her. She didn’t like it. She just wanted to play football all the time. I’m almost certain she played against boys every day during the pandemic year when football leagues were shut down."

When training resumed, the club realised her potential: "We’d heard we’d found a talented player in Lilongwe, but no one said we’d found a player of Rose’s level."

Integrated into the senior women’s group at 14, a full international at 16, and a scorer in the COSAFA Cup at the same age, Rose received extra nutritional support (protein supplements) to make up for childhood deficiencies.

But getting a first trial abroad was a long struggle: "No one really wanted to give her a chance, even for a simple trial." It was through the Right to Dream network that things started moving: first contact with Nordsjælland in Denmark, then interest from Swedish champions Rosengard, and then PSG.

"I think PSG might have been trying to bring in another Malawian, someone close to Tabitha, to try to stop Tabitha from leaving for Lyon. It’s possible, but I’m not sure."

In the end, Montpellier stepped in and offered to sign her directly, through an agency that also represents Sam Kerr. "We couldn’t even get her a trial, and suddenly they wanted to sign her..." Maguire recalls.

The support didn’t stop at the signing. Ascent Soccer keeps weekly check-ins with Rose, helps her with visa and travel paperwork, and has assisted her with very practical aspects of daily life in France.

"We had to help her with electricity, how to pay a bill. The club does a lot, but if there are questions, we have to advise. These are situations you won’t see with players who grew up in England or France, who know the system."

Maguire admits to a lingering worry, even after the transfer: "We really hope for the best for them and do what we can to support them. But have we done enough for them to stand on their own and succeed?"

Rapid progress

The picture Maguire paints of Malawian women’s football is of a sport building its foundations. There’s still no professional league: the best male players earn about $700 a month, and women’s football is far behind that. 

"Some of the best women’s teams offer training and travel allowances, but we’re a long way from a professional league."

Yet progress is real. Five or six years ago, no major city had a youth league, and there were only three regional leagues. Ascent Soccer, then playing in the central region league, finished second twice and won it once, before competing in the regional Champions League with a team of young girls - a first of its kind, according to Maguire.

"I’m not sure there’s ever been a youth team qualifying for an adult Champions League anywhere else. Only Malawi allows that."

The creation of a national league, with support from a bank sponsor, changed things by giving clubs the means to travel and raising the level of competition: "It’s much better for our players to play competitive matches every week than to win 17-0. No one learns anything that way."

Producing role models

Asked what makes him most proud, Maguire doesn’t stop at transfers to Europe. "We wanted to create players good enough to become role models, to put Malawi on the map and show it’s possible, and what it means for the country’s children - to bring a bit of joy to all this. I think we’re doing that."

He’s happy to talk about less-publicised stories than Rose or Faith: young people who would never have finished school without the academy, or Hassan, a former player signed as a child, now a coach for the boys’ teams and present on the staff for the Ray Cup final at Iceland’s national stadium.

For those who won’t make it to the top level, the academy offers pathways to university, vocational training, or other qualifications. "We try to set up, for every player, a way to earn a living - whether through football or outside it."

As Malawi plays its first Africa Cup of Nations with much of its starting 11 coming through Ascent Soccer, and an attack led by the Chawinga sisters, themselves linked to the club’s history, Maguire sums up a decade of work in a simple phrase.

"It just shows what happens when serious resources are invested in an environment where talent is nurtured and protected."

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