adminSoccer is one of the most expensive sports to administer, simply because there are so many things that require money, yet revenue streams are limited. The national teams have to compete in the African Cup of Nations qualifiers, World Cup qualifiers, Chan and Cosafa tournaments, yet the source of funds to finance all those trips and player allowances is not known half the time. It’s always a question of “We will cross the bridge when we get to the river.”
That is the scenario that Zimbabwean football finds itself in, where even some clubs undertake to take part in a league, not knowing where they will get money to keep the club afloat.
That is why we have to take a bow for some brave individuals who have sacrificed a lot to keep us entertained through football. Football is intensely followed, and the quality of the local game keeps improving – as demonstrated by the increasing number of Zimbabwean players attracting interest from foreign leagues.
Local teams are followed with passion by paint-daubed, costumed, whistling and cheering fans. The fans just want to watch football, they do not care where money to pay the players, referees, coaches and book the stadium will come from. That is why we have to thank guys like the New West City director, Bulawayo Chiefs director, Quelaton director, Ajax Hotspurs director who keep the fire burning in the Zifa Southern Region Division One league. The fact that only Tripple B, Motor Action and CAPS United are individually owned teams in the PSL shows that the game is just too expensive to run and many people who had the passion for the game surrendered after cleaning their pockets in the name of the game.
Football officials hoped that greater exposure through Supersport television would widen the sport’s appeal and provide sponsors and advertisers with a broader commercial footprint. It was hoped that sponsors would be attracted to spend and invest in the game in a way they might not have done had it still been confined to exposure through the print media.
The environment in which football administrators are operating in is torturous, and that is hardly surprising in an economic climate where companies are no longer making money and are shedding jobs, and all the old certainties and models have come into question. That is the kind of situation that Zifa officials find themselves in and we can blame them if we like, but as long as there is no long-term sponsorship to national teams, like what is happening in South Africa, we will always have problems. There is too much kia-kia business at Zifa because officials there do not know where their next meal will come from.
It is obvious that Zifa will always carry a begging bowl unless the government takes a keen interest in funding national teams.
The latest episode of travel bungling by Zifa added to a long list of concerns that have been raised by football stakeholders, but the issue here is not about personalities. It is about money. You can force the board to resign, but the new board will still face the same problems.
The national association does not have a cent in its bank account and it is a pity that sponsors come when things look rosy or when there are prospects of the team making it to the African Cup of Nations finals and when it is abundantly clear that the team will not qualify for any tournament, the sponsors also disappear.
When the team was close to making it to the Afcon finals in South Africa, companies were falling on one another, all eager to be part of the Warriors, but there is no one who is keen to stick with the Warriors project even in the darkest of hours.
There was a lot of talk last week and this week about Zifa failing to run football. Of course, the board has the mandate to run the game and must run around and look for partners, but when the country is experiencing tough times with big corporates cutting their budgets for sponsorships and corporate social responsibility programmes, you can only sympathise with those in Zifa.
The only solution would be to have national teams’ welfare falling under the Ministry of Education, Sport and Culture and that way, the government will make sure that the team travel arrangements are catered for on time by availing funds for assignments outside the country.
Some African teams enjoy backing from government when it comes to the national team and our neighbours in Zambia are always in the media thanking the government for financial support.
Apart from the mining industry which has recorded some growth in the country in recent years, the telecommunications companies are also doing considerably well on the market and one would expect them to plough back to the people of Zimbabwe by supporting the country’s number one team – the Warriors – but that has not been the case.
The truth of the matter is that without financial backing, there is nothing that the Zifa CEO, Jonathan Mashingaidze can do and there is absolutely nothing that vice president Ndumiso Gumede can do. The fact that Zifa stops breathing each time president Cuthbert Dube is away, is because he would not be around to use his own resources to bail out Zifa, and the biggest question is for how long will he do that and with what benefit?
It was embarrassing to the whole country that the squad touched down in Guinea, where they lost again at the weekend, with only 14 players and two coaches, while the rest of the players, assistant coaches and head of delegation were stranded along the way after failing to get seats on the connecting flight.
Such situations paint a bad image not only to Zifa, but to the whole country and it would make sense for the government to take a keen interest in future.
Perhaps Gumede was right that they should pull out of the World Cup qualifiers if they did not have enough resources, although it would have attracted severe punishment from Fifa and Caf.
“There is no money to pay for travel expenses and other incidentals. We have decided not to engage in any international matches unless the government chips in with financial assistance,” Gumede was quoted as saying early this year.
The football association is saddled with a $4 million debt in unpaid accommodation, transport and other bills that accumulated over several years and has been running on handouts from its president, and diamond firm Mbada Diamonds with BankABC also coming on board.
Fifa development officer for Southern Africa Ashford Mamelodi, of Botswana, and a financial consultant met Zifa officials and deplored the state of the association’s coffers early this year.
Warriors coach Klaus Dieter Pagels also criticised Zifa after the national team’s travel arrangements were bungled.
The German coach blamed Zifa for their lack of meticulous planning and organisation. He said as long as Zifa continue to fail to plan properly for such important assignments, there would not be any changes to Zimbabwean football.
“This kind of organisation is not for football. As long as Zifa continue to plan like this, Zimbabwean football will never change. The players didn’t train on Thursday. Now they will only arrive in Guinea on Saturday in the morning. They will just loosen up for an hour at the match venue and play the match. The boys will be tired. Can you expect the team to win the match?”
It’s a different picture across the Limpopo where in June 2007, the PSL pulled off an astounding coup when it signed a R1,6-billion broadcast deal with SuperSport International.
In August 2007, corporate heavyweights South African Breweries (SAB) and Absa Bank announced a joint sponsorship of more than R500-million over the next five years for South African football. SAB is behind Bafana Bafana, while Absa sponsors the PSL’s Premier Division.
In February 2008, Nedbank announced that it would be putting up R20-million in prize money for the Nedbank Cup knockout competition as part of a five-year, R400-million sponsorship of the local game.
And in August 2008, cellular giant MTN committed the same amount – R400-million over five years – to the local game, while taking over the title sponsorship of the Top 8 knockout tournament.
These deals combined have made South Africa’s Premier Football League the seventh biggest earner of sponsorship revenue among football leagues worldwide.
We await a time when such kind of sponsorship will be poured into our football and our Warriors will not worry about whether they will eat, travel or have decent accommodation, but only focus on winning the game.
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Bongani Ndlovu
Online Reporter