DeMbare won’t risk

Grace Chingoma Senior Sports Reporter
YOU know the Harare Derby is on the horizon when Callisto Pasuwa is ordered to stay in the capital, preparing the champions, instead of flying out to South Africa with the Warriors for an international friendly in Johannesburg tonight.You know that this isn’t just a routine Harare Derby showdown when the DeMbare management decide that for their head coach to be in South Africa, for just two days this week, it has the potential of having disastrous consequences for their club.

The Glamour Boys aren’t taking anything to chance against a resurgent Green Machine that is unbeaten in 10 Castle Lager Premiership matches spread over four months, their last defeat coming at the hands of their city rivals.

That Dynamos needed a penalty to win that game, goes to show CAPS United have made themselves a very difficult team to beat.
After two years of being played at the National Sports Stadium, the Harare Derby returns to Rufaro this time around and, with both Dynamos and CAPS United firmly in the race for the championship, the expectations are that there will be a record crowd for this showcase that is also being beamed live on SuperSport 9.

The difference, in points, between champions and leaders Dynamos and their bitter rivals CAPS United is just three points, the closest the two teams have come in the final third of the championship race in the past four years, and this is why the latest clash has created this huge buzz in the capital.

The game presents DeMbare with a chance to extend their lead over CAPS United to six points, should they win, and derail the Green Machine’s quest for their first league title in eight years, while Makepekepe could join their rivals on 38 points and also blow the race wide open for all the other contestants.

The heat has been rising since last week and that has forced the DeMbare management to order their head coach to stay behind and concentrate on preparing the team rather than travel with the Warriors for tonight’s friendly international against Bafana Bafana.

The Warriors will return tomorrow and if Pasuwa had gone with the team it would have meant that he would have only joined the Glamour Boys at Thursday’s training session, something which the club’s officials felt would disrupt their team’s preparations in this crucial week.

Dynamos secretary-general, Webster Chikengezha, said they sought clearance from Zifa and were given the greenlight for Pasuwa, who is Ian Gorowa’s hand-picked assistant in the Warriors’ technical department, to be excused from international duty.

“We talked to him that there is need for him to prepare the team. Going to South Africa meant he would have returned on Wednesday (today) while others would be training,” said Chikengezha.

“Pasuwa had also already written to Zifa about that as he felt since it is a friendly match he can be excused.
“After the league match last week, he went to the national team, so it has been a week with the national team now.”

The DeMbare spokesman said the Harare Derby was a different and special game that needed the entire Glamour Boys camp to plan differently and thoroughly and the absence of their coach, for a certain period this week, would not have been ideal.

Pasuwa is yet to lose a match against the Green Machine since taking over as DeMbare head coach and, having lost their assistant coach Tonderai Ndiraya, the club’s management felt their side’s technical team would have been lightweight, in a crucial week, if their head coach had flown to South Africa.

Team manager, Richard Chihoro, has been promoted to also perform the extra duties of being the assistant coach in the team and the club’s management believes he brings a cool and experienced head in their largely youthful coaching staff.

“We have our game plan and we are not looking at what our opponents have done. We are just planning for our game just like we do for any other game,” said Chihoro.

There is a feeling in the CAPS United camp that this is their biggest chance to end their four-year wait for another victory over Dynamos, with their fans having last celebrated a victory in the league in 2009, when Nyasha Mushekwi’s unforgettable double powered them to a deserved victory.

While Mushekwi has found a new base in Belgium, via Super Diski in South Africa, the man who was the creative force of those two goals, with an awesome demonstration of dribbling artistry down the right flank that left the career of Sam Mutenheri in tatters, is back in the trenches of the Harare Derby.

Oscar Machapa, the big Zimbabwe international rightback, has returned home after a spell in South Africa and rather than joining his old team CAPS United, he has chosen to cross the Great Divide and join a team that his old supporters consider to be the ultimate enemy.

He is likely to get a lot of stick from the CAPS United fans on Sunday, given that some believe that he betrayed them, but then he is not the only old boy from the Green Machine who is in the Glamour Boys’ camp.

Washington Pakamisa, a former CAPS United skipper, left to join Dynamos at the beginning of the year and scored a number of crucial goals although his scoring touch appears to have deserted him of late and he has been guilty of blowing some good chances in recent matches.

CAPS United feel that their recent run of good results in which, crucially, they have refused to lose a match, including some tough away ones in Bulawayo against Highlanders and at the Colliery against Hwange, isn’t a fluke.

And there is no better way of showing that than ending their losing streak against DeMbare, the one team whose scalp matters so much to their long-suffering fans who have seen their rivals not only dominate their recent contests but win three league titles since the last time CAPS United were champions.

The arrival of coach Saul Chaminuka has given stability, and a shrewd tactician, to the CAPS United technical team and working in tandem with his boss Taurai Mangwiro, the intensely reserved gaffer has been quietly making his mark at the Green Machine.

He believes that CAPS United have no reason to believe that they can’t win against their biggest rivals and Sunday could be that turning point.
“In football a team may have a good run and dominance over a certain team for a period and Dynamos have been doing that,” said Chaminuka.

“We are not reading much into that history.
“I don’t think there is a good time to meet Dynamos like now. We are playing very well. We are enjoying our game.
“Even though we don’t want to say much before the game, I believe we have suffered for too long. If we lose on Sunday it would be a game of football, but I don’t think we will lose.

“We are hoping that on Sunday it would be a different game.
“Even if we beat them on Sunday, I don’t think they would be hurt unless if they are selfish and cruel.”