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only Zimbabwean club good enough not to play in the preliminary rounds.
FC Platinum began their Champions League adventure with a bang, but bowed out without a whimper as El-Merreikh turned them into mincemeat in a nightmarish first half in the cauldron of Omdurman.
The Zvishavane miners, who invested heavily in player personnel hoping to make a huge wave on the continent, appeared well on course with their 8-2 destruction of Swazi lightweights, Green Mamba, in the preliminary round.
But the defensive frailties they showed in Swaziland, against such lowly opposition, told a story and were cruelly exposed by the Sudanese giants both at Rufaro and in Omdurman as they scored five goals past ‘keeper Tafadza Dube.
On reflection, FC Platinum will count the cost of the injury sustained by their leading forward, Daniel Ngoma, which paralysed their strikeforce but, then too, they will realise that their gamble to turn an experienced player like Benjamin Marere into excess baggage, clearly backfired.
But winning two games, drawing one and losing one, in their maiden dance with the Champions League is not a disaster and certainly doesn’t justify the hysteria that has been coming from the ranks of their rivals’ camps, who are labeling them a huge flop.
FC Platinum will certainly point to that cruel decision not to allow them to play on their home turf at Mandava as a turning point in this campaign and, justifiably, they will always have an alibi because the “if’ factor will always follow every argument.
If only they had played at Mandava against these Sudanese . . .
Little Hwange fought gallantly but paid a huge price for failing to win at home and crashed out on the away goals rule, without losing a match in 360 minutes of action, in a campaign pregnant with bitter sweet memories.
To their credit, Chipangano didn’t collapse when the end finally came but were still hanging in there, fighting like committed warriors, looking for that goal that could change everything and coach Tenant Chilumba felt big striker Gilbert Zulu should have delivered the killer punch.
“We should have scored at least a goal if we were good at finishing the few chances that we created, especially with Gilbert Zulu,” said Chilumba.
“It is our first participation in Caf and a good learning process.”
Hwange can be forgiven for using this campaign as a leaning curve.
Motor Action, for all their experience, will certainly not be forgiven after they promised so much but delivered very little and were preliminary round casualties in the Confederation Cup. They also became the first Zimbabwean team to be eliminated by South African opposition since the turn of the millennium, as they collapsed on home soil.
At least, Dynamos, as they usually do when it comes to the Caf inter-club tournaments, still provides the ray of light.
The imposing hurdle of African champions, Esperance of Tunisia, awaits the Glamour Boys in the next round but, with the first round set for Tunis, DeMbare can fancy their chances of using the decisive home leg of their showdown to their advantange.
Not for the first time in these Caf inter-club tournaments, the burden to battle for the cause of the nation is firmly in the hands of the Glamour Boys.
And their progress, this time, will have a defining impact on whether Zimbabwe can continue to enjoy the luxury of fielding four teams in the Caf Champions League and Caf Confederation Cup.
The provisional Caf rankings for 2013, used to determine whether a country can field one or two teams in each of the organisation’s two inter-club competitions, shows Zimbabwe lying in 11th place, with 13 points, and still within the special 12-member group that is given the luxury of fielding extra clubs.
But that could all change, when points accrued from this year’s tournament are factored in, and the winner of the Champions League will get five points, the runner-up four points, the semi-finalists three points, the teams that finish third in the group two points and the teams that finish bottom of the group getting one point.
For the teams in the Confederation Cup, the winning team contributes four points to its country’s ranking, the runners-up contribute three points, the semi-finalists get two points and the teams that finish third and fourth in the group get one point.
DeMbare have to qualify for the group stages of the Champions League, for the country to get any more points on the board on the Caf table, and a loss at the hands of Esperance might leave the nation vulnerable should teams from other countries do well.
The Glamour Boys played a huge part in the success that brought the extra slots with their good run into the Champions League semi-finals in 2008 and Monomotapa followed the good work by adding some points on the board when they made the group stages of the same tourney the following year.
While Gunners failed to make the group stages in the 2010 Champions League show, Dynamos did and, although they finished bottom of their group, the point they earned was important.
Last year both DeMbare and Motor Action added nothing to the tally after they both crashed out in the first round.
The Glamour Boys have been driven, so far, by their deadly forward Takesure Chinyama, who arrived after a lengthy spell in Poland during the off-season, and has been the leading their line with aplomb.
Three goals in his first two Champions League matches have catapulted Chinyama into the spotlight on the continent and yesterday he was the featured player on Caf’s official website, www.cafonline.com
Chinyama told cafonline.com that his team’s target was to reach the final of the Champions League and emulate the Class of ’98 that reached the same stage and wrote their legendary status at the club.
“We are eager to do well and will remain focused as we turn our attention to an even tougher encounter against the competition’s titleholders who are our next opponents,” said Chinyama.
“We are going to use our local league games to prepare for the continental matches, we will not relax because we want achieve our goal.
“We should have scored more goals today (Sunday) but we did not use every opportunity created hopefully we can do that for our next games as we play and get better as a team.”
For Dynamos this is familiar territory as they have been walked this road before and played such tough opposition in the past.
There are issues, related to the shape of the team and personnel that need to be sorted out, and hopefully coach Callisto Pasuwa will use the next two weeks to address those concerns.
The defence co-ordination was better on Sunday but the jury is still out because they were never tested by balls being flighted from the flanks, where Patson Jaure’s lack of height could be exposed, while something will have to de done about their flat midfield.
Pasuwa and his men were back in training yesterday, which means the coach can see the need to keep working on their weaknesses, and time will tell if they will still be the last Zimbabwe team standing when the Champions League enters the group stages.
Zimbabwe Teams In 2012 Caf Inter-Club
Tournaments (So Far)
P W D L F A Pts
Zimbabwe 12 5 5 2 22 13 20
Success Rate – 55.55%.
Online Reporter