Editorial Comment: Finally, Zifa remembers its football heroes!

ZIFA’S announcement this week that they will, from this year, introduce awards of excellence to honour football heroes — the legends who graced our fields in the past and those who are starring right now — is a huge step in the right direction.

The inaugural awards are set to be held in Harare on November 11 and according to ZIFA president, Philip Chiyangwa, it will be a glitzy evening with the country’s football leaders promising to invite some African football legends to grace the occasion.

Five legendary Zimbabwean footballers are set to be honoured on the night, another five will be honoured next year with a similar number set to be honoured in 2019 when the awards will again be reviewed with a view to improve them.

That category of legends includes the likes of George Shaya, a five-time Soccer Star of the Year, Bruce Grobbelaar, the former Liverpool and Warriors goalkeeper, Tendai Chieza, Peter Nyama, Barry Daka, Nyaro Mumba to name, but just a few.

The importance of honouring these yesteryear stars can never be overemphasised given that we need to preserve the history of our national game so that it won’t be washed away by the passage of time.

It’s important that our future generations should always know where their game came from, pick some lessons from its history and then use them to try and improve the sport and legends like Shaya, whose magic used to mesmerise fans during his playing days, should never be forgotten.

That is why we fully support the introduction of these awards and also the announcement by ZIFA that they will this year unveil the Hall of Fame where they will induct those who deserve to be honoured for the part they have played in the history of our national game.

But, in honouring the yesteryear greats — be them the footballers, coaches or referees — ZIFA have also rightly not forgotten the stars of our game today, the footballers who are in the trenches flying our national flag in international competitions, the best of whom are set to be rewarded.

While we have traditionally honoured our outstanding players, coaches and referees on the domestic football scene since 1969, through the Soccer Stars of the Year awards, we have seemingly forgotten our stars who ply their trade in foreign countries and whom we largely depend upon to fly our flag in international tournaments like the AFCON and the World Cup qualifiers.

This has left our best footballers in a quandary where they are not honoured at home, despite their exploits for the national team and playing in bigger leagues, because they are ineligible for the domestic Soccer Stars of the Year awards and, usually, fall victims to hometown decisions, in the foreign leagues they play, when the time to honour the best comes around.

Khama Billiat was, by far, the best footballer playing his trade in Africa in the 2015/2016 season when he didn’t only lead his South African club, Mamelodi Sundowns, to the league championship, but he also inspired them to their maiden success story in the African Champions League.

However, when it came to the ceremony to honour the players who had excelled during that season, we saw the old Confederation of African Football leaders, known for their bleeps and blunders, somehow give the top award to Ugandan goalkeeper Denis Onyango when it was clear that Billiat had done more.

That the decision to snub Billiat came at a time when relations between our football leaders and the old CAF leadership, led by Issa Hayatou, were strained because of boardroom manoeuvres by the domestic football bosses to oust the Cameroonian from his post, fuelled speculation that the whole process was rigged to ensure a Zimbabwean wasn’t honoured.

Now, with the new awards, at least, someone like Billiat can find solace in getting honoured by his country and there is a lot of value in that.

In the past, a player like Knowledge Musona, who was outstanding in leading the Warriors to their first Nations Cup finals appearance in more than a decade, was somehow not honoured back home last year for his great efforts because we didn’t have the awards to ensure his grand efforts would be celebrated.

But all that is now set to change, thanks to the new initiative by ZIFA, which will see the best Zimbabwean footballers, who are plying their trade in foreign leagues, being honoured back home in the event for excelling during the season.

Zimbabwean football has to honour its heroes and we have Felix Tangawarima, who has been excelling as a FIFA referees’ instructor, but he doesn’t seem to get any recognition from home, and we have Solomon Mudenge, who has been climbing up the corporate ladder at FIFA, but never gets to be honoured back home.

Football is about celebrating its heroes and we are happy that, finally, some people at ZIFA have opened their eyes and seen value in rewarding the men and women who are the stars of our national game even when they are mostly plying their trade in foreign lands.