adminTHE defining moment from Orlando Stadium on Tuesday night came shortly after Knowledge Musona had just driven home a dream goal of stunning beauty, raw power and technical finesse. Given the demons he has faced, in his barren spell since his return to South Africa, and the abuse he has endured from rival fans, the expectation was that Musona would explode in hysterical fashion celebrating this special goal.
It’s not easy to freeze your emotions, in the heat of the moment, after you have just scored a goal as beautiful as the one Musona got and, crucially, when you have just delivered it in the arena that your club’s biggest rivals call their home.
But, somehow, Musona bottled all his emotions and turned and ran to the stand, on the other side, that housed a bunch of noisy and colourful fans who had been cheering the Warriors all night.
For a long time, during the 2014 World Cup campaign, Musona had been part of a cast of Warriors whose displays, in a shambolic quest to qualify for Brazil, had pushed the loyalty of their long-suffering fans to the edge of breaking point.
But even after the disappointment of scripting the worst World Cup campaign, in the history of the Warriors, their fans had, crucially, not deserted them and they were there in numbers at Orlando Stadium.
Musona, in his moment of genius, refreshingly had the presence of mind to realise that, for all the special qualities of his goal, and the headlines that it was going to generate, there was a special group of people who needed to be saluted for a patronage that had stood the severest of tests and a bond that had stood the biggest of tests.
As the Warriors and their fans celebrated, together as one united family, football once again looked this beautiful game for us and, for a moment, the horrors of the failed World Cup campaign, which had just reaped two points out of a possible 18, with no victory in six matches, were lost in that golden unison of happiness.
There are things that we tend to take for granted, and wrongly so, and one of them is that the fans will always back the game, support the team, back the players, turn up for the next game and cheer the Warriors even against a depressing background of them ending a World Cup campaign without a win.
Zimbabwe’s football fans are no different from Nigeria’s supporters — they want to see their Warriors competing regularly at such festivals like the Nations Cup and World Cup, competing well at such tournaments and enjoying the warmth that comes with such success stories.
In an era where even Tahiti can play at the Confederations Cup and Cape Verde can qualify for the last phase of the World Cup campaign, before falling victims to an unforgiveable administrative blunder, it’s a fair call to say that the local football fans stand among those who feel they have been abused the most by their national football teams.
But such is their undiluted patriotism that, just two days after the team’s worst World Cup campaign, they were there in good numbers cheering at Orlando Stadium and the fact that this was just a friendly international didn’t matter.
What mattered was that these were their Warriors, their heroes, their players, their sporting ambassadors, their representatives, their men and no opposition came as bigger as Bafana Bafana, the men who cloned our kit colours and turned them into their brand.
The failings of Alexandria and the humiliation of Harare at the hands of the Pharaohs were forgotten and so were the back-to-back defeats at the hands of Guinea, of course, the losses hurt and a World Cup campaign was destroyed, but beyond the eternal search for greatness on the football fields, there was a special bond between the Warriors and their fans.
That bond could be shaken here and there by the depression of those failings and the bitter taste of those defeats but, as demonstrated by that beautiful moment at Orlando Stadium on Tuesday night, it’s rarely broken and, to Musona’s credit, he had the presence of mind to remember these special fans and acknowledge their presence.
Gorowa And The Cards He Played
Ian Gorowa still sharply divides opinion here and his critics claim that he is a lightweight coach, with no clear playing style for the team, and even after he made it three straight wins away from home, there are still some voices of doubt who believe he isn’t the right man for the job.
But, to his credit, Gorowa has done more than what was asked of him, taking the team to the CHAN finals, beating Zambia in their backyard and, VIA ORLANDO, beating those cocky South Africans in their backyard too.
Suddenly, there is some respect coming from south of the Limpopo towards us, towards our football and Bafana Bafana captain, Itumeleng Khune, said something that made a lot of sense after that game at Orlando.
“We can’t think that ‘Zimbabwe, it’s just Zimbabwe’ — people still have that perception . . . they don’t think, how many players do they (Zimbabwe) have in our country, playing for big clubs. If we had brought our European players to come and take part in last night’s game, I think we could have seen a different ball-game because they brought their most experienced players who are playing at a higher league in the PSL.”
Now, that’s serious respect, isn’t it?
Because Khune is telling us that the South African players in Super Diski are no match for their Zimbabwean counterparts and if Gorowa fields a team of eight Warriors based in Mzansi, Bafana Bafana needs to field their players based in Europe for the two teams to compete on a level playing field.
For me, the difference was Gorowa.
He breathed life into Musona, with that pre-match talk telling the striker that it was his chance to score again on South African soil, to end this barren spell in grand style, and when your coach gives you that encouragement, shows you that respect, it’s easy for a player to deliver and, as if on cue, the Smiling Assassin struck.
He gave Musona his belief back, the freedom to roam the final attacking segments and impose himself in those areas, he asked him to play his natural game, playing to his strengths and knowing that a goal was just a kick away, and he was repaid in grand fashion with a superb goal, so rich in quality, it would have received even a standing ovation at Old Trafford, Anfield, Emirates or Stamford Bridge.
Suddenly there was that chemistry between Knowledge and Khama, where they had been ordered to control and pass as quickly as possible in the old flawed regime, now they had the freedom to play to their strengths, and if that meant keeping the ball as long as possible, so be it and, boy oh boy, they thrived in this dispensation.
And their energy, pace, movement and trickery made us menacing, every time we attacked, and we deserved more than just the two goals we got, the Botswana assistant referee made a horrible decision to disallow our effort for an off-side that never was, Musona should have scored after just two minutes and Nkatha missed a sitter.
But for all our attacking brilliance, Gorowa impressed the most in the way he organised his defensive unit, investing his confidence in Danny Phiri who blossomed on the big stage, giving Felix Chindungwe a new lease of life and, crucially, a rock-solid partner to help him and then reviving the stalled international career of Onismor Bhasera who flourished the more the game went on.
The coach played his cards right and was rewarded with a huge victory and the fans loved it, and loved him too, and the importance of that priceless victory was captured in the wild celebrations of team manager, Sharrif Mussa, after the second goal went in.
The Unfortunate Controversy Of The Number 13 Jersey
There has been quite a huge media blitz in the City of Kings over the Warriors’ decision to give Khama the Number 13 jersey in that match against Bafana Bafana when there was an understanding that the shirt had been retired in honour of the great Adam Ndlovu.
His brother Marko was very angry this week and said:
“I do not have anything much to say because I called Brian Moyo and he said I should speak to Zifa vice-president Ndumiso Gumede. Gumede referred me to Zifa chief executive officer Jonathan Mashingaidze. I have not spoken to Mashingaidze because his phone is going unanswered.
“This shows that Zifa are liars and the world can see because they have gone back on their word. We are hoping to meet as a family to discuss this.”
But all this unfortunate drama could have been avoided if it had been clarified that while Zifa could have an intention to retire the jersey, their authority here is compromised because, if the Warriors qualify for CHAN, the Nations Cup or World Cup finals, the association will be forced by either Caf or Fifa to use the Number 13 jersey.
The Caf regulations, which now feed off the Fifa regulations, for the final tournaments are very clear that numbers for players have to be from Number One to 23 and there is nowhere you can skip Number 11, the same way Argentina found out they couldn’t retire Diego Maradona’s Number 10 or Cameroon found out that they couldn’t retire Marc Vivien-Foe’s Number 17.
But French club Lens have retired the Number 17, in honour of Foe, Manchester City have retired the Number 23 jersey which he wore at the club and Chelsea retired the Number 25 jersey in honour of Gianfranco Zola, which shows that while this can be easily done at club level, it’s not easy to implement at national level.
Of course, Zifa can decide that no player wears the Number 13 jersey during qualifiers but if that jersey is to be used at the finals, because the Fifa and Caf regulations say so, then the whole noble mission of honouring a player loses its meaning.
A Harare Derby Like No Other
Dynamos are unbeaten in Harare in 30 league matches, spread over one-and-half years, CAPS United are unbeaten in 10 league matches, only three points separate the giants and they are plunging into the Harare Derby tomorrow — what a story, what a show.
One thing is guaranteed, though, there will be a huge crowd at Rufaro.
Maybe the better team win, may the fans enjoy and may peace prevail.
Oh, by the way, Arsenal bought a world-class player, Mesut Ozil, and even though I’m a rival, I have to give them all their respect because it’s not every year that you get a man who has made more assists, in Europe, than any other player in the past three years.
To God Be The Glory
Come on United (as in Manchester and not CAPS)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Chicharitoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
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