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straight losses.
The Warriors have lost three World Cup/Nations Cup games on the trot — for the first time in 15 years — after defeats in Cape Verde, Burundi and at home against Guinea at the National Sports Stadium on Sunday.
Now, Rahman Gumbo and his men have to turn it around and avoid defeat against Mozambique in Sunday’s World Cup qualifier or they could join the Class of ’97, led by the late Ian Porterfield, which created history for all the wrong reasons.
There is the bigger issue of getting their 2014 World Cup up and running, after a depressing false start at home, where the misfiring Warriors failed to beat a pedestrian Guinea and started their campaign in the worst manner possible.
Gumbo, who received the backing of his employers at Zifa after being subjected to a torrid time by a section of the fans who turned on him as the reality and pain of defeat became inevitable at the giant stadium, knows fully well the significance of Sunday’s match.
The social media sites have been jammed, since Sunday, with Zimbabwean fans digesting the events at the giant stadium and, while some of the arguments in the debate make sickening reading, what comes out clearly is the severity of the pain they all endured.
Some of the fans have been severe in their criticism of Gumbo, who accepted the role on a caretaker basis after a crisis ignited by the decision to suspend the popular Norman Mapeza, and want him shown the exit door.
Some have drawn comparisons over the way the South African Football Association and Zifa reacted to the events on Sunday.
Safa, whose Bafana Bafana drew 1-1 against Ethiopia on the same day in Rustenberg in a World Cup qualifier, yesterday fired coach Pitso Mosimane and this appears to be giving weight to those advocating for Gumbo’s dismissal.
That group argues that if Safa felt that a draw was too bad a result, warranting the dismissal of a gaffer they have been nurturing since 2006 when he was thrust into the Bafana Bafana structures as an assistant coach, then why should a home defeat for the Warriors provoke a different reaction from Zifa?
Safa were so desperate to ring the changes, after Bafana Bafana’s lifeless show against Ethiopia made it seven winless games for South Africa, that they are ready to pay a staggering R20 million (about US$2,3 million) cash payout to Mosimane to buy him out of his contract.
Mosimane was earning between R800 000 and R1 million a month as national team coach.
Marathon meetings characterised the day in South Africa after Bafana Bafana’s draw against Ethiopia and deliberations that started at 9am on Monday morning did not end until after 1am yesterday as the Rainbow Nation’s football chiefs insisted on finding a solution to their crisis.
The Safa emergency committee called in to deal with the crisis sent a delegation, after their meeting in Johannesburg, to Rustenberg where they called the Bafana Bafana players and Mosimane into a room, shortly after midnight on Monday, to drop their bombshell.
Safa vice-president, Mwelo Nonkonyana, and chief executive Robin Petersen delivered the execution orders and Mosimane was allowed to make a dignified farewell to his players before leaving the team hotel in those early hours of yesterday morning.
At around 1am yesterday, an hour after midnight, the Safa leadership was still working and released a statement confirming that they had sacked Mosimane, two years before the end of his contract.
Crucially, while Bafana Bafana were boycotted by their fans and played before a poor crowd, the Warriors attracted a big crowd on Sunday.
The group that supports Zifa in sticking with Gumbo claim that the high turnover in coaches has not brought either stability or results for the Warriors in the past and, after being in charge for just two games, they feel it’s still too early to judge the coach.
That his team had countless good opportunities to win Sunday’s match, with its leading forwards — Knowledge Musona and Takesure Chinyama — missing good chances either side of the break, presents an alibi to those in support of Gumbo’s stay at the helm of the Warriors.
A victory against a team that needed to qualify for the main draw, but showed commendable resistance in restricting Egypt to a 2-0 win in Cairo last Friday, could rebuild part of the bond, between the coach and the fans, shattered by Sunday’s nightmare at the National Sports Stadium.
The Warriors’ defeat on Sunday was their third straight loss and they matched the Class of 2001 who also lost three World Cup/Nations Cup qualifiers on the trot in
May and June after losing 1-2 to South Africa (away), 1-2 to Ghana (home) and 1-2 to the DRC (away). The Bafana Bafana tie was a World Cup qualifier while the matches against Ghana and the DRC were Nations Cup ties.
Zimbabwe’s worst run was between June and August in 1997 when the Warriors lost four World Cup/Nations Cup matches on the trot after losing to Cameroon, Angola, Ghana and Togo in succession.
In all the four matches, the Warriors lost by an identical 1-2 scoreline with the games against Togo and Cameroon being World Cup qualifiers while the matches against Ghana and Angola (both played away) were Nations Cup ties.
It could have been worse for the Warriors, during that period, had they not drawn 0-0 against Angola in Harare, which sandwiched their defeats against Cameroon in
Harare and Yaounde, taking their winless streak during that period to six games, where they lost five.
Between June and August ’89, the Warriors went for four winless matches in World Cup/Nations Cup assignments after losing 1-2 to Algeria, 0-3 to Nigeria, drawing 1-1 against the Super Eagles in Harare and being hammered 0-5 by Cote d’Ivoire in Abidjan.
Before then Zimbabwe had also failed to win in four straight matches in ’84 when they lost 0-3 against Malawi, 0-2 against Zambia and 1-4 against Uganda but then held Tanzania to a 2-2 draw.
The game against the Flames, though, was a friendly international.
Now, with all the pressure weighing heavily on their shoulders, the Warriors have to avoid defeat in Mozambique or they could join Porterfield’s men in the wrong section of the history books for the longest losing streak.
The Warriors still have their friends in their corner and yesterday Mbada Diamonds announced that they will provide a US$50 000 carrot for the team to win the game in Maputo and pocket the jackpot.
The company will also pay the camping allowances for the players, as they did in the game against Guinea, and their appearance fees in Maputo.
“We have offered the same incentives to the Warriors for the game against Mozambique because we really want them to win so that they can bounce back into contention,” said Mbada Diamonds’ media liaison officer, Tafadzwa Chiremba.
Online Reporter