Online Reporter
Veronica Gwaze
Zimpapers Sports Hub
WHEN Tonderai Ndiraya stepped onto the podium on Friday night, those in the room shifted a little.
The lights caught his black suit, the red tie and the measured stride.
He smiled as if the moment belonged to him, even though life has been trying to drag him offstage for years.
The 2025 Soccer Stars Awards crowd rose to applaud the man who had just guided Scottland to a Premier Soccer League (PSL) title in their first top-flight season.
He collected the Coach of the Year Award with the calmness of someone who has carried heavier things in private.
You could feel the room reading his face, searching for cracks. They knew he was jobless. They knew he would not lead the PSL title winners Scottland, which he coached, into the CAF Champions League.
Many expected that smile to falter. It did not.
If anything, he looked lighter than he had in months. His posture said he had seen enough storms to know that another one was not going to bring him down.
“If I say I am heartbroken or disappointed, I would be lying. Life has taught me to accept whatever comes my way and pick up positives from every situation,” he said with a small chuckle.
He lingered on the word “positives”, the sound of someone who has been forced to find them often.
“This is what has kept me going and I am happy that I have a strong support system, especially my family. They have been there, emotionally backing me,” said Ndiraya.
His story has never been neat. It has always circled back to this place — somewhere between triumph and the door out.
In 2018, he was shown that door at Ngezi Platinum Stars while sitting second on the log, five points behind FC Platinum with 15 still to play for. Two-and-a-half years of work ended abruptly, and he returned to Dynamos hoping to take a familiar project one step further.
Four years later, that old script played out again.
Despite leading Dynamos to a third-place finish in 2022, he was asked to leave after the club decided not to renew his contract.
He assumed he had done enough. Instead, he found himself starting over once more; this time in Shamva, at Simba Bhora.
For many, taking that job felt like watching a proven coach shrink himself.
Ndiraya never saw it that way. He built what he could with what he had. His first season was spent fighting off relegation, finishing 12th, with a side still finding its feet.
He responded with a transfer window that reshaped the team and a year later he delivered a championship.
It won him his first Coach of the Year Award since entering the top flight in 2015.
It felt like the breakthrough he had been waiting for; the moment that would finally take him to the African safari that had always seemed just out of reach.
Then he left Simba for Scottland, a newly promoted side that wanted a leader bold enough to carry their ambitions.
When he explained the decision on Friday, he spoke like a man who measures his journey on a longer timeline.
“I believe that when the time comes, I will go to the Champions League. I firmly believe that, but for now I have to focus on developing my craft as a coach,” he said.
“Many may view it as delays or betrayal or anything else, but for me, it is God buying me time to develop and make my own history.”
Ndiraya made history with Scottland in months.
Their title win placed them alongside Black Rhinos as the only teams to win the league in their debut season.
He returned to the same podium with another Coach of the Year Award in hand, but before he could even look ahead to continental football, the familiar twist arrived.
He and the club went separate ways.
That kind of exit would flatten many. Not him.
He sat with Zimpapers Sports Hub this week looking more like a man preparing a fresh run than one nursing wounds.
He spoke of Calisto Pasuwa and Norman Mapeza with admiration, listing their achievements with the clarity of someone studying a route map.
Pasuwa’s four straight titles with Dynamos. Mapeza’s four league crowns with Monomotapa and FC Platinum, along with his cup successes.
“I will not replicate the history as it is. For me, it is a target of making it with different teams,” he said. “The journey is never easy and I know more challenges will continue to come as I move on because currently about four clubs are after my signature,” he said.
“I believe that from my time at Simba Bhora, I have learnt how to survive at new clubs and I believe that I can be of great value there, but I am not hinting on anything.”
He laughed as he said it. He is a man who knows his phone will ring no matter how long this off season feels.
Seeing him walk up to that stage on Friday told its own story.
Standing tall, jobless or not, he carried the air of someone keeping pace with his own timeline, not the league’s.
The cheers felt earned. The smile felt real. And when he spoke about the future, he sounded like a coach who believes he is closer to his destination now than he has ever been.
“To be honest, I feel great right now. I am elated because I have just edged closer to my personal target. Only after then will I start seriously thinking about the African safari, but well, if it comes earlier, who am I to say no?” he said.
