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Mutare City Rovers finally coasted to their first Castle Lager Premier Soccer League win when they got the better of fellow Premiership debutants, Border Strikers away at Mandava on Monday.
While this might have been a battle of minnows, two struggling sides just cutting football teeth in their debut top-flight campaign, it, nonetheless, provided Gusha with the much-needed respite from the problems bedevilling them on and off the field.
The victory becomes the team’s first in four attempts, following earlier three fruitless efforts. For the first time in that period, the team did not concede; keeping a clean sheet that scantly helped their goal difference.
While the players and the technical department have made a huge statement on the pitch with that away win, it remains to be seen whether the club will also score a victory off the field of play in the form of the executive improving on several aspects of its administration where it has been found glaringly wanting.
On the pitch, the team has drawn first blood after overcoming the Beitbridge-based side 1-0 and that places the ball firmly in the executive’s court and many a Mutare football faithful will be eagerly watching to see how the administration responds to that challenge.
Last week, this newspaper broke news of the behind-the-scenes happenings at the club in which we exclusively lifted the lid on the grim side of things in Gusha camp where players were rewarded with a paltry $10 and a sachet of mahewu for their sweat on the pitch in a losing, but encouraging, cause against giants Dynamos at Sakubva last Sunday.
Surely, that pittance is a mockery of the players’ lofty efforts and an indictment on the executive.
Surely, by now the Mutare City Rovers administration should know better that football the world over has become serious big business that requires technocrats of sorts to run it and reap the benefits it offers.
Clayton Masekesa, the Gusha Bhora publicist, is familiar with and fully understands the language Gamechanger is speaking and as the interface between Rovers bosses, the public and the media, please, knock some sense into their heads that taking care of the players’ welfare should not be a “desire” but an outright responsibility and absolute obligation.
Not any person in whatever human endeavour can work on an empty stomach and because the playing and coaching staff deserve better, there shall come a time when they are going to demand it. Please, let it not come to that point as it will throw the project off the rails and the brand gets to suffer in many unpleasant ways.
Coach, Taku Shariwa sounds like a man who knows and likes his football and Gamechanger found his remarks in the Border Strikers match preview interview resonating with sense: “We are going to Zvishavane with the aim of getting maximum points because we just have to prove that we deserve support by winning our matches. By winning our matches, we instil confidence in our prospective supporters and that is one way we can be guaranteed of support as a team or even corporate support.”
Now, the players and the coaches have played their part and passed on the turn that it is over to the Mutare City Rovers executive to do their bit, too, by ensuring that those entitled to and owed their dues get them.
Friday Football Echoes will be honest and acknowledge that this administration is not entirely hopelessly ineffective as earlier feared and this column lauds them for taking the positive step of roping in Shariwa to skipper the Gusha ship that threateningly looked headed for the murky waters and eventual wreckage under the uninspiring Kenny “Bokande” Kachara.
Please, don’t wait for things to come to a boil first so you get to address and redress grievances. As wise men create their own mistakes through others’, the sincere hope is that Mutare City Rovers have learnt from their Beitbridge counterparts Border Strikers, whose coach Saul Chaminuka conceded that the challenges in their camp is affecting their morale as most senior players boycotted the tie against GushaBhora on Monday.
The players’ welfare has to be well catered for, working conditions improved and good results will roll, thereby bringing smiles on everyone’s faces – from the club to the fans.
MaKepeKepe’s Derby Delight
Finally, CAPS United got one over their most fierce rivals Dynamos when the Green Machine edged the Glamour Boys 0-1 in a cagey 33th edition of the eagerly anticipated Harare Derby at Rufaro on Sunday. The famous win ended MaKepekepe’s woeful winless cycle against DeMbare that spanned over seven solid years or 2 576 days, about 368 weeks – in which a draw was their best result.
It also evened the number of times each team has got the better of the other – with both teams having won 12 and drawn 9 times apiece.
While Lloyd Chitembwe, the CAPS United tactician, plotted that sweet success, he, in the process, compounded the misery of his opposite number Jorge Paulo Silva.
Another Game, Another Fight for Silva
The Dynamos Portuguese coach is deemed a dead-man-walking and gets to survive the chop, at least for now. The DeMbare leadership this week reportedly decided to put up with the under-fire coach until after travelling to Hwange this weekend, after which they will decide his fate – even as he came short in meeting the target spelt out in his three-match ultimatum that demanded maximum points after falling to sworn enemies CAPS United.
Zifa president Philip Chiyangwa has also waded into the Silva saga as he fuelled the flames by calling on the Glamour Boys leadership to sever ties with the beleaguered mentor, whom he described as soiling the country’s biggest club football brand.
Foxes’ Finest Football Moment
Leicester City, against all the odds heavily staked against them, are English football champions – a feat they get to accomplish for the first time ever in the club’s 132-year history. For a side that only last season was mired in the relegation dogfight and cheated the chop to finish 14th under Nigel Pearson before appointing Claudio Ranieri at the start of the season, this completes one of the most spectacular stories in modern day football.
Congratulations, the Foxes, for a fruitful hunt and thanks for providing us with a refreshingly different football story!
And for that fan who turned heads at King Power wearing his No.4 jersey imprinted “Drinkbeer”, in solidarity with the team’s English midfielder Danny Drinkwater, he will now certainly enjoy drinking the beer as he toasts to the club’s finest football hour.
Leicester had the distinction of being crowned champions without kicking a ball after their coronation was delayed at Old Trafford where they were held 1-1 by Manchester United. Chelsea, however, did them a favour by restricting chasing Tottenham Hotspur to a 2-2 stalemate in a heated North London derby in which tempers almost flared at the end of the match. Then Leicester City and Chelsea square off in the season’s final game, a match which can be read as the handover-takeover lap of honour for the outgoing champions.
The Hazardous Eden
In blistering form last season and eventually being crowned the league’s player of the year, Eden Hazard scored the title-winning goal as Chelsea clinched the title by beating Crystal Palace. Again, this season, the Belgium forward netted the score that won Leicester the crown, netting the equaliser against Spurs on Monday night.
This was only Hazard’s second league goal this term in a disappointing season in which he has failed to replicate last season’s form.
Feedback:
(I) just got my copy of The Manica Post at a Zuva Garage in Harare. I stay in Nyamapanda and Mutare is (my) home, but kuno kubasa. (The) fact is every team play(s) with added motivation when playing DeMbare. . .who doesn’t want to beat Dynamos! My question and fear is with the reported peanuts being offered Gusha players, mmmm, are they going to be naturally motivated playing other less glamorous teams in the league. . .pakaipa! Also, you did well to mention the Young Warriors match. . .other publications skipped that one, so we were in the dark. . .well done! – 0784 043 218.
It’s Game On, Play On!
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Online Reporter