Warriors boycott training

Lawrence Moyo in CAPE TOWN, South Africa
THE Warriors’ CHAN expedition came to a chaotic end yesterday as players boycotted their final training session over outstanding bonuses. The players went to the field for the session that should have started at 5pm, but refused to train. They were pressing for outstanding bonuses after lasting the distance in the tournament. The players have not been rewarded financially for making the last four and yesterday they downed tools.

The coaches waited for over an hour while head of delegation, Nigel Munyati, addressed the players and training was eventually called off.
The players headed to the hotel where they went into a meeting addressed by manager Shariff Mussa and the coaches.

Boycotting the third-place play-off against Nigeria at the Cape Town Stadium today does not look like an option for the Warriors given the repercussions.
But they will go into battle clearly under prepared and low on motivation.

By reaching the semi-finals, the Warriors earned themselves US$250 000 but such funds are not immediately available and will only be channelled later into the Zifa account.
Munyati tried to play down the boycott saying that it was a day for light training, which he claimed they did.

The players fear they will be abandoned, if they disperse before the money is paid out and they cannot fight Zifa individually.
They are also concerned that a new Zifa board could come into office next month and might decide that they were not part of the arrangement struck between the players and the old leadership.

With the tournament officially ending today, the players have to vacate the Garden Court hotel provided by the Local Organising Committee by tomorrow.
However, the Warriors are only scheduled to leave Johannesburg on Monday night.

This means they have to find alternative accommodation for tomorrow night and the situation isn’t looking good, especially against a background of the clashes that started yesterday.

It emerged last night that Zifa had told the players they were going to split the US$250 000 CHAN prize money.
Under the arrangement, the players’ share would be half of that amount while the cash-strapped Zifa would use their share to settle the outstanding bonuses.

Shariff and the coaches later left the meeting room while, about 30 minutes later, at around 8pm, the players ended their closed-door meeting.
Just as they were about to have supper, Shariff and the coaches took the players back for a make-or-break meeting.

Coach Ian Gorowa was not part of the meetings as he headed straight to his room from the aborted training session.
However, he went into the closed-door meeting at 2008hrs.

Gorowa emerged from the room at 20.38hrs for his supper.
There was no immediate position from the leadership after the marathon meetings.

But while the players’ concerns were genuine, there is suspicion, too, that a group of players, who have no future in the team, might have influenced the boycott.