Online Reporter
Lovemore Dube and Zibusiso Matiwaza
PLUMTREE had organised football late in the 1960s with Border Kings, British South African Police and another Select side that would later be named Black Horrors.
Competition was among these three teams and once in a while a team owned by one Kile called Swallows from the Brunapeg end of Mangwe would play against the trio. But because of distance it was not enticing to hence most of the matches were among these and schoolboys from Empandeni and Thekwane.
However, one of the teams sought a new challenge of playing Rhodesia Association Football.
This entailed playing Bulawayo teams like Rex in the Second Division assured of a trip to Bulawayo every second weekend, an exciting occasional excursion into the city, a rarity for many but thanks to football they would see the bright lights and tall buildings of the city.
Round about 1971, under the influence of Albert Matiwaza, his two friends a Mr Chikuni who worked for the Post and Telecommunications and one Ebson Maphosa, a manager at Redfern Farm in Bulilima and a Dingumuzi resident, Black Horrors came into being.
Matiwaza was the chief financier.
The border town, a railway exchange service provider and a hub of commercial activity servicing Marula, Figtree and whole of Bulilimamangwe was teeming with talent. There was no entertainment except football and hence the push to play other clubs from Bulawayo.
Matiwaza, whose family is still prominent in the town and its northern district of Bulilima, owned a butchery whose proceeds supported the club.
At the time of joining the Rhodesia Football Association structures, there was one Grey Ncube, an outstanding player who had finished his secondary school education at Thekwane.
From his days at the Plumtree African School (now Dingumuzi Primary School), he had shone among his peers be it at rightback or midfield.
Upon finishing his O-level, Ncube was given a ready job as cashier/cum manager at Velamuva Butchery, a place he would stay at for close to a decade before a move to join the local authority as a clerk where he would rise to welfare officer.
Ncube rose to being the cornerstone of Black Horrors among the early players who included Des Pullen a pupil at Embakwe and by 1972 players who would rise to luminaries Onias Musana and Lemmy Mnenekwa arrived.
Musana had been a student at Thekwane too, while Mnenekwa turned out to be a footballer for the club by accident.
Visiting from Chitungwiza one winter morning, arriving by train walking to Cold Storage to board the Matiwaza Isuzu truck to Plumtree after a match against Rex, saw a star combination born.
It is said after some reluctance Mnenekwa was fielded as a second-half substitute and struck a quick brace to reply to the 2-0 lead that had been taken by Rex.
It is said he struck an instant good combination with Ncube and with Musana along the way, they became the division’s hottest threesome.
Their moves were as if choreographed with a telepathic understanding of each other which legendary Highlanders defender Douglas Mloyi says it’s among the most formidable he ever met.
Ncube, Musana and Mnenekwa guided the team to Division One two years later competing in the regional league up to 1976 when there was a national championship.
But with Highlanders pulling out of the Rhodesia National Football League, Horrors was one of the first teams invited to the just formed South Zone Soccer League in 1977.
The hottest players of that league included the Horrors trio of Musana, Ncube and Mnenekwa, Highlanders’ Majuta Mpofu, Doughty Sithole, Douglas Mloyi, Tymon Mabaleka, Danny Mahaso, the Boonzaier brother Richard and Neil, Greg Fassen, Mactavish Dube, Ren Nqadini, Muriyengwe, Francis Sikhosana, Conrad Nkomazana, Big Joe Moyo, Alfred Ngedla Phiri and Nicho Mabhena.
With Musana off to Moroka Swallows in 1979, one of the team’s best years, the burden to carry Horrors forward in the South Region National League, Ncube came to the party and guided Black Horrors to the semi-finals of the Chibuku Trophy losing 2-0 to Caps United.
It was a great feat to go that far in a tournament where the likes of Old Miltonians, Rio Tinto, Arcadia, Umtali United, Wightmans, Gweru United and Olympics had been knocked out earlier.
Gifted as a marker with the workrate of a trojan horse, skilful and powerful, Ncube won the hearts of many standing toe to toe against Stix M’tizwa and Joel Shambo in one of the best midfield combinations to grace local stadia.
Despite the humiliation of traveling on a truck and being laughed at on arrival at Rufaro, they won the hearts of many for having come from as far as Plumtree, almost 540km away from a centre whose population was below 2 000.
That was the club’s highest point, but it was also the beginning of a descent that resulted in its collapse into extinction a few years later.
The advent of Independence saw opportunities for some prevailing and a majority leaving for greener pastures outside football.
While Chikuni and Maphosa passed on in the 1980s, Matiwaza breathed his last 20 years ago, still harbouring the revival of Black Horrors.
Several attempts to have a Plumtree team to unify the community have come by, but none has been as good as Horrors.
A staunch cricket, rugby and Tottenham supporter, Ncube died in Plumtree on 3 March and got a hero’s send-off at his burial on 8 March.
He was 73.
Speaker after speaker spoke about the great player Ncube was and his humility.
He got praises from Chief Hikwa who was among the mourners.
Over 2 000 people attended the funeral in one of the biggest gatherings in the city.
Additional reporting by Zibusiso Matiwaza
