Chronicle Editor
Ricky Zililo, Senior Sports Reporter
THE Zifa board is expected to meet this weekend to deliberate on recommendations made by its technical development committee on under-fire Warriors’ coach Zdravko Logarusic and his technical staff.
Zifa has been under intense criticism following the Warriors’ poor performance at the Cosafa Cup where the six-time regional champions returned without a win as they failed to go past the group stage.
A six-man Zifa technical development committee made up of chairman Bryton Malandule, vice-chairman Andrew Tapela, Nelson Matongorere, Wisdom Simba (vice-chairman Zifa Eastern Region), Stancillous Nyachoye (board member Zifa Northern Region) and Wilson Mutekede met last Saturday to review the Warriors’ technical reports and forwarded their recommendations to the board.
Malandule earlier indicated that the board would meet a week after the technical development committee to deliberate on the recommendations and map a way forward.
Malandule reiterated that the Zifa board has the power to fire or retain Logarusic.
Statistics show that Logarusic has had a depressing stint as Warriors’ head coach, with only one win out of 12 games in charge.
Without going in detail, Malandule said they took the impending World Cup qualifiers into consideration in their recommendations.
“The technical development committee met to review the Warriors’ reports so that we craft the way forward, look at the challenges presented and how best to address them. We’ve made recommendations to the Zifa board through the association’s chief executive officer.
“The board will deliberate on the recommendations, make the nation know how our technical team will look like going into the World Cup qualifiers,” said Malandule.
Zimbabwe are in Group H with Ghana, South Africa and Ethiopia in the 2022 Fifa World Cup second-round qualifiers.
The Warriors and Ethiopia are the only teams in the group that have never qualified for the global football showpiece.
Warriors’ followers, including Zifa, believe that the national team has a fair chance of qualifying to the next stage.
“As a board, we always give ourselves targets and qualifying for the World Cup is one of those. When we entered the Cosafa Cup tournament, our objective was to win it. Right now, we are celebrating qualifying for a third consecutive Afcon finals where the target is the knockout stage.
“We believe that we have a golden generation of Warriors who can take us to the World Cup and the recommendations we make to the board, also factor in the targets that have been set,” said Malandule. – @ZililoR
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