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Ricky Zililo, Senior Sports Reporter
THE Zifa Referees’ Committee is planning to introduce spot checks on match officials to keep them on top of their game.
Speaking on the sidelines of the closing ceremony of a two-week long referees’ and instructors’ clinic facilitated by Fifa instructors Felix Tangawarima and Gregory Krzosek from Poland, ZRC chairman Bryton Malandule said this would ensure match officials maintain fitness.
Malandule’s call for spot checks comes against the backdrop of top referees Pilan Ncube, who is on the Fifa panel, Hardly Ndazi, Tinashe Marange and Blessing Mpande failing essential fitness tests last week.
Their failure means they can’t even handle local matches until they pass the next fitness test.
“Our referees must always keep fit. In future we are going to have spot checks whereby if we feel that you are not fit we will call you and you undergo a fitness test. If we commission your game and suspect that this referee is struggling in terms of fitness you will have to go through a fitness test. We expect these referees to have training programmes because refereeing is now a profession, that’s why we always cry that when inflation goes up we want to see referees getting fair compensation to sustain them,” said Malandule. – @ZililoR
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