As Zimbabweans still try to come to terms with the Warriors’ embarrassing exit from the Afcon qualifiers at the hands of Tanzania in a two-legged encounter, another football disaster has struck.
Final Whistle with Brian Nkiwane
The Mighty Warriors, Zimbabwe’s remaining hope, were also sent packing from the African Women Championships by neighbours Zambia. This means the nation must this year remain spectators while other nations enjoy the fruits of good sport organisation.
The two shameful episodes exposed sports administration in this country. The Warriors and the Mighty Warriors join the misery of our national Under-17 and 20 boys’ teams who were slapped with CAF bans for failing to fulfill away matches in their respective competitions.
But, barely 10 years back, Zimbabwe had vibrant sport persons ranging from athletes, footballers, boxers and field events participants, just to mention a few. The sportsmen and women were under the direction of vibrant sports administrators.
This has been a year to forget for Zimbabwean sport — being reduced to mere spectators in almost all sporting disciplines. The next Warriors assignment will be in September, the Cosafa Cup while the Mighty Warriors will only take part in the Zone 1V games set for Bulawayo in December.
What boggles the mind is the indifferent attitude exposed by government to the barrage of attacks on the poor preparatory plans for the Warriors match against Tanzania by newspapers, which were awash with headlines speaking about disaster in the camp.
Neither the government nor the football governing body Zifa was prepared to assist in addressing the chaos. They only came out of their shells after disaster had struck with full page apologies.
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Stories about the chaos in the Mighty Warriors camp also received no attention from government and Zifa and the result was another disaster.
The Warriors were getting as little as US$15 for a day in camp while the Mighty Warriors got US$100 to fulfill the Zambia away tie.
That definitely could not have inspired players. There are many that believe the issue of money contributed to the poor showing.
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