Bongani Ndlovu
Stanford Chiwanga, [email protected]
HIGHLANDERS are flirting with self sabotage, and the tragedy is that they are doing it in broad daylight while pretending nothing is wrong. Benjani Mwaruwari did not return home to be a ceremonial coach, a feel good appointment, or a convenient shield for executive indecision.
He came back because he believes he can fix Bosso on the pitch. But belief alone does not win football matches — support does.
Five games. Five draws. Not a single defeat. In any rational football environment, that would trigger cautious optimism.
At Bosso, it has instead been met with silence, hesitation and that familiar Highlanders habit of folding arms while the house slowly burns.
Anyone who has watched those five matches with honest eyes knows this team is not broken. It is organised. It presses. It circulates the ball better than before. It looks coached. That is not luck — it is evidence of work. Which is precisely why this situation is so infuriating.
Something is clearly right. Something is equally clearly missing.
Benjani has told them what he needs. Not demanded. Not thrown tantrums. He has identified an analyst and a striker — Isaac Ngoma — and said, plainly, this is how we move forward. In modern football, a coach without a match analyst is like a pilot flying blind. This is no longer 1995, where instinct and motivation speeches carried the day.
Today’s margins are survived through data, trends, opposition patterns and in game adjustments. Denying Benjani an analyst is not cost cutting. It is football negligence.
Then there is the striker. Football is unforgivingly simple: if you do not score, you do not win. Highlanders can dominate territory, control spells and look pretty for 90 minutes, but without a clinical forward the result will always be the same — a draw that feels like a defeat. Benjani knows this. He played at the highest level. When a striker of his calibre points to a specific player who fits his system, the correct executive response is action, not delay, doubt or paranoia.
By refusing to act, the Highlanders executive are effectively tying Benjani’s hands and then measuring him by the stopwatch. That is not management; it is entrapment. They are setting him up to fail and waiting for the crowd to turn so they can say, “We tried.” No, they did not try. They hesitated. They procrastinated. They hid behind process while the season slipped.
This job should be the fulfilment of a lifelong dream for Benjani. Instead, it is being twisted into a job from hell. A toxic environment does not always announce itself with shouting matches and boardroom drama. Sometimes it reveals itself through inaction. Through indifference. Through the quiet refusal to fully back your own appointment. That kind of environment kills projects slowly and then acts shocked when the obituary is written.
The Highlanders executive must also understand this uncomfortable truth: when Benjani fails — if he fails — they fail with him. Their fates are welded together whether they like it or not. Coaches are fired first because that is football’s easy solution. Executives linger a little longer. But not forever. Bosso supporters are emotional, yes, but they are not stupid. They can see when a coach is being undermined. They can see when results are not matching performances. And they will eventually ask the right questions.
Why was he not given what he asked for? Why was a legend treated like an intern? Why does Highlanders keep repeating the same mistakes?
When those questions begin to echo, no amount of press statements will save anyone. Benjani might walk out first, but the same door will eventually swing back open for those who refused to do their jobs. The Bosso faithful do not forget. They wait.
Right now, the evidence says this: the football is improving, the belief is there, the direction is right — but the tools are missing. It could be the analyst. It could be Ngoma. It is probably both. And that is entirely fixable, if the will exists.
Highlanders must decide what they want. Do they want success, or do they want control? Do they want progress, or comfort? Because you cannot choose pride over professionalism and then cry when the table does not move.
Back Benjani. Properly. Fully. Now. If he succeeds, Bosso rises with him. If he fails after being backed, that failure would at least be honest. Anything else is cowardice dressed as caution — and Highlanders have bled too much over the years to keep indulging that deceit.
Online Reporter