Online Reporter
Tadious Manyepo
Zimpapers Sports Hub
ZIFA are set to unveil an epoch changing football tournament, the US$15 million Presidential Challenge Cup, which will run for the next five years and reclaim its position as the country’s biggest knock-out tournament.
And in the true spirit of “not leaving anyone and any place behind’’, the competition will not only involve the elite Premiership clubs, lower Division teams, but will also see Area Zone sides participating.
Although ZIFA officials were yesterday not at liberty to discuss the upcoming competition, sources revealed that the tourney will mark a major turnaround in the association’s development programmes.
Such is the magnitude of this massive game-changer in domestic football that it will also encompass Women’s football and the grassroots teams from Under-14 level.
The watershed tournament, whose senior men’s winners, will earn the ticket to represent Zimbabwe in the CAF Confederation Cup, will be bankrolled by President Mnangagwa.
The gesture from the Head of State reaffirms how much President Mnangagwa loves the beautiful game and sport in general.
President Mnangagwa also recently ensured the Warriors were motivated when he donated, from his own pocket, US$400 000 to their 2025 Africa Cup of Nations’ cause for the continental football jamboree currently underway in Morocco.
But there is no doubting that the ZIFA Presidential Challenge Cup is the biggest of them all, touching lives across both genders from the grassroots to the elite level.
There were indications yesterday that the massive tourney, which will also see Five-A-Side and Beach Soccer Clubs competing in a ZIFA Cup for the first time, will be launched in Harare later this month with competition rolling on afterwards starting at the lower league levels.
The sources said over 300 senior men’s and women’s, at least 40 grassroots and over 160 futsal and beach soccer teams are being earmarked to take part in the massive jamboree.
The US$15 million is spread over the next five years with US$3 million catering for each of those years.
The men’s tournament will see teams from Area Zones up to the Premier Soccer League battling it out for honours which will also come with a ticket to represent the country in the CAF Confederation Cup while the women’s Division One sides up to the Zimbabwe Women’s Premier Soccer League clubs will also be involved in their own “royal rumble’’.
Each of the 10 provinces across the country will have an Under-14 and Under-16 boys’ and girls’ teams each taking part in what will be a league-format for the categories as ZIFA seeks to see youngsters playing the game throughout the year.
The coming of the biggest tournament in the country was one of the key pillars in ZIFA president Nqobile Magwizi’s manifesto when he was campaigning for the post before landing it on January 25, last year.
As things look the tournament could be launched right in the same week that Magwizi and his executive were elected into power in what will be a fitting gesture for them.
Of the US$3 million yearly sponsorship added the sources, there is a plan to splash US$1,8 million towards the senior men’s competition with US$400 000 committed to the women’s section.
The junior cup will see a total of US$500 000 being poured while Beach and FUTSAL games will get US$200 000 and US$100 000 respectively.
“It seems the Zimbabwean football landscape will never be the same again with the coming in of the ZIFA Presidential Cup.
“It will be sponsored by President Mnangagwa and its sheer size will change the trajectory completely.
“Over 500 teams right from the grassroots, beach soccer and futsal to the men’s and women’s Premiership will take part in this tournament,” said one of the sources.
“This ZIFA executive is pulling every stop in order to, make football the beautiful game that it must be. Rather than being an exco that only runs national team affairs like the previous boards, ZIFA is being proactive, seeking the relevant partners to develop football.
“I can tell you that all is in place and the launch will be held sometime at the end of this month or early February.
“All stakeholders have been informed and they are fully aware of how ZIFA will roll out the tournament at every level.
“Look, the grassroots issue falls directly under the Memorandum of Understanding that was forged between ZIFA and the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education two or three months ago.
“This shows the commitment by ZIFA to go back to basics and start developing the game from its roots going up’’.
This development reaffirms how the new ZIFA executive have managed to drastically turn around the chequered image of the association which, all along, was a playground of heightened controversy. Apart from earning the confidence of the first citizen, President Mnangagwa, corporates are now falling over each other as they come forward to partner an attractive brand that ZIFA has become.
Sources also added that a top financial institution is keen to also add significant extras into the grassroots project.
