adminYesterday Bosso drew again at Barbourfields, held 1-1 by basement club Quelaton, but that certainly won’t provide any relief to the army of Glamour Boys’ fans after their team crashed out of the Confederation Cup in Luanda last night.
In the year that they suffered their worst humiliation on the continent, after a six-goal thrashing at the hands of African champions Esperance,
DeMbare’s relegation into the unfashionable world of the Confederation Cup turned into a non-event.
They failed to score over 180 minutes against Interclube and, after opening their campaign with two goals on the road in Maputo, the Glamour Boys have now failed to score in two games on the road in Tunis and Luanda.
Save for the game against Liga Muculmana, DeMbare have lacked character on the continent this season, have been uncharacteristically off colour at home and have been bullied by opponents in their away assignments. The indomitable spirit, which used to fuel the Glamour Boys to impressive campaigns in the jungles of African football, has been lacking from this team. And you get a feeling they are still to recover from the nightmare of the 0-3 mauling in Algiers last year when, against all odds, MC Alger overturned a 1-4 first leg deficit.
The impact of the events in Algiers had on the players, especially those on their maiden dance with football on the continent, has been huge and that they have struggled to recover from that nightmare also tells the true story of their shortcomings when really tested.
Rodrick Mutuma, who somehow managed to win the Golden Boot last year, hasn’t scored a goal in continental inter-club matches since that night in Algiers and, for all his bullish talk in the countdown to yesterday’s match, there was nothing on the field to support it. Mutuma emerged out of that Algerian nightmare with a swollen eye after being repeatedly punched by his opponents. Denver Mukamba, who was the heart of DeMbare’s 4-1 win at home, was targeted for some rough tackles in Algiers and, while he somehow redeemed himself by becoming the first DeMbare player to score against Esperance, he never scaled the heights that he touched at Rufaro against the Algerians. He missed yesterday’s match as he switches his focus to serving a Super Diski club after all but clinching a deal to play for Bidvest Wits next season.
Guthrie Zhokinyi, sent off in Algiers, missed the massacre in Tunis as he served his suspension and returned in time to play in the Confederation Cup and while he acquitted himself well, defence wasn’t the Glamour Boys’ Achilles Heel yesterday.
Instead, it’s the absence of a midfielder who can perform the playmaking role, with consistency and good enough to impose himself on the continent, which has been DeMbare’s biggest weakness.
Once Murape Murape was ruled out of yesterday’s tie, with the tonnes of experience that he has and the raw never-say-die spirit that DeMbare needs to drive them, you could tell that this battle had been lost before a ball had been kicked.
Without a leader in the middle, something they worsened by a suicidal decision not to register old war-horse Desmond Maringwa whose experience would have come handy in such feisty encounters, Dynamos were always flirting with disaster on the continent. Zambian midfielder Arthur Kaseloki might have been brought to provide such presence in midfield but, exiled from regular first-team football since a registration botch-up in which his work permit wasn’t regularised until two weeks ago, he lacked the cutting edge that could only be found from playing regularly.
This Class of Glamour Boys looked lightweight on the continent and if Chinyama wasn’t scoring goals, chances of DeMbare failing to score were very high and having been frozen out by the tough Angolans in both legs, the mission became doomed.
Ironically, the big forward was substituted in both games, at home and in Luanda, but if Callisto Pasuwa was still investing his trust in a player like Martin Vengesayi, to provide salvation at this level of the game, then his judgment was flawed.
The speed merchant might have proved a useful impact player last season, coming in and turning the game, as Dynamos marched to league championship glory.
But there is a level of difference between football on the domestic scene and on the continent and, given the way he has struggled locally, it would have been a miracle to expect him to make a difference when he came in yesterday with close to 20 minutes to the end.
Eight years to the month when an adventure into the same tournament ended with a humbling 0-5 aggregate loss, at the hands of Ghanaian side King Faisal Babes, DeMbare’s return to the Confederation Cup was certainly not a disaster on that same level.
But their exit from the Confederation Cup puts into context how the mighty Glamour Boys have fallen after years of building a very good reputation for themselves on the continent as a very strong and competitive football club counted among the men when the time came to separate them from the boys. Pasuwa will look at this contest as one that he lost at home when his team terribly lost their way with a lifeless performance so ordinary it would not have reaped them a point against Quelaton if this was a league match.
The coach will realise he was wrong to waste Kaseloki in the first half of that first leg by playing him in an unfamiliar role wide on the right flank where he was badly exposed.
Moved into a familiar central role in the second half, he became productive but, by then, the Angolans had settled.
As is always the case at Dynamos, when something like this happens, there will be an inquest and those who have been fighting for the removal of Pasuwa will push even harder.
But there was something, which bordered on being ordinary, about this team on the continent and having won just one, out of six matches in the Champions League and Confederation Cup, DeMbare didn’t deserve anything better than what they got.
Hopefully, this is the last time our representative team will be knocked out by Angolan opposition this year.
Online Reporter