admin
Sports Reporter
Simba Bhora, Bikita Minerals or Arenel are hardly the first names that spring to mind when it comes to Zimbabwean football.
Simba Bhora is a team from the small mining town of Shamva and has only been playing in the top league for one and a half seasons while Bikita Minerals and Arenel are first time arrivals in top flight football.
And yet, Simba Bhora is currently battling for the title, as is Manica Diamonds, also recent additions to the PSL. For mining magnate, Simba Ndoro, his creation is exactly what he hopes for, Simba Bhora beginning to make their presence felt: a club punching above its weight on the field of play and with its own stadium and a loyal fan base to boot.
“I wanted to build a club with the potential of considerable commercial upside. And it is because of this same potential commercial upside along with good corporate governance, financial transparency and effective management that convinced our partners like Tinmac and Panjap to join forces with us,” Ndoro told B-Metro Sport.
But Simba Bhora is not the only mine or company-backed club in the Premiership that is part of this revolution and positively changing the face of the local game. Along with FC Platinum, Ngezi Platinum Stars and Manica Diamonds while Bikita Minerals have been tearing the form book apart.
Too, the Castle Premier Soccer League also includes Arenel, TelOne, Chicken Inn, Hwange, ZPC Kariba, Herentals and Green Fuel ensuring that 12 out of 18 clubs, about 67%, in the league are owned by either a mine or a corporate.
From platinum money at FC Platinum to property development at Sheasham and the diamond encrusted resources of Manica Diamonds, the takeover of the Premier League gathering momentum.
And even below the country’s top competition, the mine or company footprint on the Zimbabwean game is deepening and widening — and raising even more questions over who will grab the game by the scruff of its neck and who will let go.
A substantial number of the teams in Zimbabwe’s leagues now have some form of company ownership. They’re spread from the top of the pyramid down to Blanket Mine, the Gwanda team that plays in the Zimbabwean second tier and is owned by the mine it is named after.
They also span the country, from Mutare in the Eastern Highlands all the way up to the Zambezi River, home of Premiership side ZPC Kariba owned by power utility, Zesa.
Football has the capacity to garner global attention in a way few other sports can. And that’s key to the attraction, said Ndoro.
“Clubs such a Dynamos and Highlanders are better supported than many other clubs locally. In terms of commercialisation and monetisation of various assets, however, they sometimes do not have the financial resources to compete with mine and company-owned clubs,” he said.
Like all similarly structured football clubs without solid financial muscle, Dynamos and Highlanders are a vital source of local pride, pleasure and often frustration, much like Spanish giants, Barcelona.
From out yonder and beyond, the roars of spectators reverberate across townships, often far away from the football stadium and its associated madding noise. Football teams not only carry strong emotional significance but also represent core social and economic institutions within their sometimes faltering local economies.
Football clubs draw national and sometimes international tourists into regional towns and cities, filling pubs and restaurants on match days. Indeed, the promotion or relegation of a team often has multiple and compounding socio-economic impacts on entire cities.
The clubs’ advertising opportunities, in turn, will eventually help bolster the images of these mines and companies – for example, positioning Mimosa Mine as a social contributor, or Simba Bhora’s partners like Tinmac and Panjap as excellent potential business partners. Thus, while owning a club is a high-risk investment, with enough time and resources, a team can be turned into a revenue-generating machine.
derick.khumalo