Zifa president Nqobile Magwizi and Warriors coach Michael Nees were in the United Kingdom to convince talented young Zimbabwean footballers born in the UK to consider turning out for the Warriors.
It was a move that was well received by the football loving public, who are eager to see the Warriors flourish at the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations finals and also qualify for the 2030 World Cup.
The Zifa president then made a trip to Germany on the same mission but sadly, Magwizi forgot that the Warriors were not the only Zimbabwe national soccer team but the Mighty Warriors as well.
Even, though, the Zifa leadership — upon election — promised to look after the Mighty Warriors in the same way they treated the Warriors, that promise seems to have been broken if not forgotten for reasons best unknown.
The question is : Why was the Mighty Warriors coach, Sithetheliwe Sibanda, left behind in such an important escapade when she too is coach of a senior Zimbabwe national football team ?
Wasn't this the opportunity for Sibanda to start scouting for talent in building a strong Mighty Warriors team for the future in the same way Nees is doing for Afcon 2025 and other assignments ?
Or does it mean that Zimbabwe does not have British born women footballers in women football leagues across England, who are good enough to be persuaded to play for the Mighty Warriors ?
Or is it a case of what we have always fought against that foreign coaches are always being accorded special working tools compared to locals ?
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Sadly, even those who have been very vocal about the inclusion of our England based footballers in the Warriors set up have been quite about the Mighty Warriors' own cause.
Yet after the Afcon elimination by Angola, these were the same people who pointed fingers at Sibanda for fielding locally based players who had not been active for three months or so due to a long off season break.
Even the league itself was being run like boozers football with matches being played now and there and here and then which gave little game time for the players.
We agree and admit that Zifa did a lot for the Mighty Warriors in terms of comfort in camp, and attractive allowances, but that only, was not enough for the team to succeed.
Surely, how did the authorities and the critics alike expect the Mighty Warriors to do well when they did not have a single friendly match to prepare themselves for the Angolan challenge ?
We hear that Sibanda is in Addis, Ababa, Ethiopia, at the invitation of CAF for the CAF Women's Development Programme, which means CAF has belief in what she can offer and we should also have that confidence because we appointed her our national team coach.
In all this, all what we are simply saying is that Zifa should give Sibanda and the Mighty Warriors their full support especially now, the time of team building.
We all know that the Mighty Warriors do not have immediate international engagements and now is the opportunity to give the coach the time to build her team without worrying much about immediate results.
We should remember that this is the same team that made Zimbabwe proud by qualifying for the 2012 Olympic Games and we cannot abandon them because they do have matches right now.
Right now, the Mighty Warriors need regular friendly games to start building a strong team that can be called The Mighty Warriors and good enough to bring back long lost glory.
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