Normalcy returns at Herentals

Tadious Manyepo Sports Reporter
TALENT drain, uncertainty and embarrassment had become the order of the day at Herentals, in the past three months, as their future in the Premiership football looked all but doomed.

The Students appeared set to play in the ZIFA Northern Region Division One in the new season after the Premier Soccer League disciplinary committee found them guilty of match-fixing and docked them three points.

Had Herentals not appealed, taking their case to the ZIFA Appeals Committee, they would have been left with insufficient points tally to stay in the top-flight league.

They would have been replaced by Chapungu.

But the ZIFA Appeals Committee noted several flaws in the way the PSL disciplinary committee handled the case and overturned the lower league’s ruling.

Herentals were accused of allegedly having bribed their way to a 3-0 league win over Black Rhinos at the National Sports Stadium on October 19, 2019.

But the ZIFA Appeals Committee, chaired by lawyer Stead Kachere, said the testimony provided by the then team manager of Rhinos, Gift Kamuriwo, which was used to nail Herentals, had a lot of inconsistencies.

They also ruled that the process, which led to conviction, had a number of flaws, including denying Herentals the right to be represented by a lawyer in a case which had grave consequences.

The PSL disciplinary committee, said the judgment, also appeared biased against Herentals and, on one occasion, turned Kamuriwo into both an accussed and a witness.

Kamuriwo also failed to a print out of his phone records to confirm that, indeed, there was communication between him and the Herentals team manager, Oliver Chirenga.

The Herentals family and Chirenga, whose life ban was also overturned, are celebrating in the wake of the ruling by the ZIFA Appeals Committee.

Club secretary-general, Fainos Madhumbu, whose team suffered the humiliation of being denied entrance into the PSL annual meeting three weeks ago, said justice had been delivered at last.

“Like we have been saying all along, we don’t even know where the allegations were emanating from but, thank God, justice has just been delivered,’’ said Madhumbu.

“We are already focusing on the field of play where I think the players had been subjected to mental torture.’’

Herentals have lost some of their best players, because of the uncertainty brought about by the PSL disciplinary committee’s ruling.

Midfielder Juan Mutudza requested to be released and secured a one-year loan move to Dynamos.

The influential pair of Richard Hachiro and Carlos Mavhurume are now with CAPS United.

Kelvin Bingala, the scorer of the solitary strike that secured Premiership status for the Students on the last day of the season against Bulawayo Chiefs, has since joined Lumwana Radiants in Zambia.

Ecstatic coach, Kumbirai Mutiwekuziva, said he now needs to concentrate on the mental side of things in the 60-day window brought about by the suspension of league football as the country battles the coronavirus outbreak.

“This thing had a negative mental impact on the part of my players,’’ said Mutiwekuziva.

‘’There are players who left the team, we could have convinced them to stay, but there were no guarantees they would be playing Premiership football due to this unfortunate issue.

‘’Now that we have been given the all-clear, we will be concentrating more on the mental side as the players had been affected by the ban.

‘’We will also be beefing up the squad this week.”