adminwhen he took charge of his native Holland, failing to qualify Clockwork Oranje for the 2002 World Cup in South Korea and Japan after losing his opening match at a home.
Are we going to face the same predicament with Rahman Gumbo?
Louis Van Gaal admitted at the first post-match interview that he was to blame for his side’s failure to win the match, adding that he read the numbers with his team of statisticians and analysts and decided on the squad to pick and the team to play.
“I set out the Netherlands to play and it is my team. I will not talk of lucky or lack of it. I will not look at the number of chances we created or those we missed, which is the work of analysts, mine is take responsibility for my actions.
“If Holland failed to win, it means Van Gaal has failed in that regard, I’m paid and accepted this job to win matches not lose them then look for excuses later,” the Dutchman told the media after losing his first match.
He was a caretaker coach at the time and fittingly got the sack.
Gumbo, who took charge of his first World Cup 2014 qualifier at home against Guinea and lost 1-0, said exactly the opposite.
“We had seven chances (actually three) that could have given us goals but we wasted all that. The players got into the box but failed to score all the time. Should I have gone in and played honestly? Lucky was just not on our side today,” Gumbo told the media.
What is not in doubt is that Zimbabwe lost the match and the fans registered their dismay by chanting the name of the recent past coach, Norman Mapeza.
While the fans used their emotions to conclude that Gumbo is not the man for the job, the numbers of the match tell a different story, though ultimately it pointed to the same conclusion that Zimbabwe were beaten by Guinea and that Gumbo got it wrong with his tactics.
The statistics from the match showed that Guinea covered more distance in the entire match than Zimbabwe and crucially ran 26,9km in the first half compared to just 18,4km for Zimbabwe and the goal that was to prove the winner came in the first half during which they dominated play.
For Guinea, it was not just distance covered, but in critical areas of the pitch during which they had possession of the ball — something Zimbabwe struggled to have in the first half.
Possession of the ball during the entire match showed interesting figures — in the defensive third Zimbabwe had the ball 30 percent of the time while Guinea had it for just seven percent.
In midfield Zimbabwe kept the ball 48 percent of the time compared to 63 percent of the time for the opponents.
Crucially Zimbabwe had possession in the final third 22 percent of the time while Guinea cushioned 30 percent.
What then need to be explained from these numbers is that Zimbabwe dominated possession only in their defensive third because their wingbacks barely moved from their block while Guinea allowed Zimbabwe to keep the ball in that area of the pitch because it was less dangerous for them.
The moment Zimbabwe tried to move the ball into midfield Guinea quickly got possession and almost monopolised it, while looking for gaps to prod upfront. That explains the lion’s share of possession in midfield for the visitors.
But crucially keeping the ball in more dangerous positions for the opponents increases your options of getting a chance, something Zimbabwe struggled to do until
after the substitution of Razzagui Camara and Habib Balde, only then did Ovidy Karuru begin to have some feel of the ball.
The substitution that came well into the twilight of the match was meant to congest the midfield and slow the flow of the game for Guinea as they were content to defend their solitary Ibrahim Traore 26th minute strike.
Zimbabwe were happy to run Guinea rugged in the second half but all their four chances in the half were forced to come from wings — often not by wingers or wingbacks but by strikers forced wide, thereby limiting their presence in the box.
It was heart-rending to notice that the better chances were created by either Knowledge Musona or Takesure Chinyama from wide positions, with nobody in the box to do justice to them because they would have gone out to fish.
Both Karuru and Khama Billiat never came to the party.
Billiat, in particular, has to be coached to understand that football is not all about dribbling, it is also about passing, running into space, supporting the man on the ball and closing gaps for the opponents to limit their options.
The Guinea coach who used to the letter the template of match stats and details they gleamed from Zimbabwe’s 2-1 loss to Burundi knew what he had to do to get a result.
“We did our homework well, got the full video and match stats for Zimbabwe’s last game and used that to get a rough idea of how they play even though we expected a much changed side.
“The inside information that we had also helped us in setting our game around ensuring we keep possession for as long as possible while ensuring that we close down their wing backs to limit the danger of crosses into the box especially after we lost Bobo Balde, who is a good reader of the game and an excellent header of the ball.
“I am very happy that it worked perfectly for us. Football is no longer a game of intuition, you need numbers to justify every decision, whether it is selection of players or formation or substitution. You cannot just sit in your office and think that one player is better without the numbers to back you up. It is a recipe for disaster because you will be held accountable,” Michel Dussuyer said.
The French born coach, though, refused to write off Zimbabwe.
“Zimbabwe are a good side and they play a high tempo game, although most of their passes are square and do very little damage to opponents. But they have a very dangerous player, their number 2 (Musona) is good, so is the number 15 (Vusa Nyoni) who I believe should not be wasted at wingback, he has to play midfield.
“It is just my observation; maybe the stats showed that he can serve the team better in that position, so the coach is right to play him there but he can be a good option in midfield,” added Dussuyer who said he hopes to beat Egypt in Conakry at the weekend.
Online Reporter