BY MICHAEL KARIATI
EX-DYNAMOS assistant coach Philemon Mutyakureva has described Malawi-based former Warriors coach Kalisto Pasuwa as the greatest coach in both Dynamos and Zimbabwe football history due to the accolades he has won in his career thus far.
Mutyakureva served as Pasuwa’s understudy at Dynamos for three years between 2012 and 2014, helping to oversee one of the most successful periods in the club’s history.
Pasuwa won four successive domestic championships with the Harare football giants from 2011 to 2014 before leading the Zimbabwe senior soccer team to the 2017 African Cup of Nations (Afcon). Pasuwa’s coaching credentials continue to blossom in the region after he led Malawian football side Nyasa Big Bullets to their second successive TNM Super League title in December. In total, the former Zimbabwe international has now raked up six straight league crowns for himself; a record which Mutyakureva believes makes Pasuwa worthy to be recognised as the country’s greatest mentor.
“Whether one likes it or not, Pasuwa is the best. “What he has done speaks for him. He won four league titles with Dynamos, qualified Zimbabwe for Afcon, and now he is in Malawi, where he has won two league titles again,” said Mutyakureva in an interview with Standardsport.
Mutyakureva was Pasuwa’s assistant at the Glamour Boys winning three successive league titles as well as the Mbada Diamonds Cup. The 43-year-old Mutyakureva, who played for Black Mambas, Chitungwiza United, Dynamos, Kiglon and Sporting Lions, still has fond memories of his time at Dynamos and says he could have returned to Dynamos in 2018.
However, the departure of the then Dynamos president Solomon Sanyamandwe scuttled the move and the Harare giants turned to Lloyd “Mablanyo” Chigowe.
“We had struck an agreement for my return, only for Sanyamandwe to lose his position before I had started work,” said Mutyakureva, who also previously served as assistant coach at Harare City.
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Since his retirement as a player in 2007, Mutyakureva has remained part of the Zimbabwean game, including his current attachment as a football coach at Hartmann House Primary School, having also previously been at Eaglesvale School.
“One cannot leave football easily. The moment you are out for a few days, you are also left behind. I am in junior development at BN Academy and am lucky that every year, we have a British coach coming to conduct refresher courses,” said Mutyakureva.
He has over the years also taken his time to improve on his overall coaching qualifications and is looking forward to one day handling one of the Zimbabwe national soccer teams, having acquired a Caf A licence badge.
“Who does not want to coach his own national team? That is my dream. I want to do something for my country, whether be it the Young Warriors or Mighty Warriors, that is a national service,” said Mutyakureva.
