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Robson Sharuko Senior Sports Editor
HOOLIGANISM triumphed over sanity at Maglas yesterday as this year’s edition of Chibuku Super Cup, which has struggled to shake off the demons of controversy, was marred by the chaos of yet another abandoned match in the Midlands.

Just two weeks after the premature ending of the first round battle between Yadah Stars and Chicken Inn at Ascot in Gweru, the madness shifted 120km southwards to Zvishavane where the quarter-final showdown between Shabanie Mine and CAPS United also ended prematurely yesterday. The stunning beauty of the picturesque Boterekwa pass — where the highway which connects Gweru and Zvishavane via Shurugwi negotiates its way through the mountains — failing to provide a reminder to these merchants of chaos of the value of a world of tranquillity.

A fortnight ago, Chicken Inn — behaving as if they have become domestic football’s version of the outlaws of America’s Wild West like Pancho Villa, Jesse James or Billy the Kid — made a mockery of the profile of the corporate identity they carry in their DNA and stormed off the pitch at Ascot in protest over a late penalty awarded to Yadah Stars. The Gamecocks had probably set the stage for the chaos that would unfold that afternoon when, just days before that match, they threatened not to fulfil that game unless it was moved to their base in the City of Kings.

And, having been forced to travel to Gweru for that showdown against a team which had beaten them in their backyard just a week earlier in a league match, Chicken Inn dumped their good-boy image into the Ascot waste-bins in a show of both rebellion and stupidity and, in the process, called time on their participation in this tournament, at least, until 2019. They knew the brutality of the rules and regulations that ensure football isn’t turned into a 90-minute version of World Wrestling Entertainment, a free-for-all landscape where bullies roam its landscape as if they own the world, was always going to weigh against their ridiculous, if not strange, decision to storm off the pitch in protest.

Of course, they are paying a big price for that — a $2 000 fine having been imposed on them, elimination from the tournament, exclusion from the next edition of the tourney and their coach Rahman Gumbo has been dragged before a disciplinary hearing by the league’s leadership. But, for those who thought all that chaos had to do with some imaginary curse at Ascot, where a goalpost collapsed just before the hour mark leading to the abandonment of a league match between Chapungu and Dynamos, the events at Mandava yesterday proved them wrong.

Favourites CAPS United, making their second away trip in this tournament after having played the first round in Mhondoro where they inflicted the first home defeat suffered by Ngezi Platinum in their backyard this year, had complained about a number of things, not least, the quality of the playing surface at Maglas. Given it’s been more than a decade since they last won at Maglas, the Green Machine’s transformation into crybabies pleading for a change of venue for this game was understandable, among their followers, but the league’s leaders refused to entertain them.

As it turned out, the lucky people of Zvishavane now had the privilege of watching a fifth Chibuku Super Cup match in their town this year after the two preliminary round games were also played there while FC Platinum also hosted Chapungu and Highlanders battled Harare City at Mandava. And, yesterday, the Green Machine were trailing to a rare goal by Shabanie Mine defender, William ‘’Munhu Mutema’’ Mapfumo just after the break, the identity of a goal-scorer who in his previous stint used to be part of the cast of players at their ultimate rivals Dynamos, enough to magnify the pain.

Oh, by the way, even the identity of the Shabanie skipper, Farai Mupasiri, provided a reminder not only of those Glamour Boys where he used to play but, crucially, of the one the Green Machine left to slip through their fingers when this forward tried, and somehow failed, to make the grade at Makepekepe during pre-season. But CAPS United always score, they always do, if not Dominic Chungwa then John Zhuwawu, if not Harlife Zvirekwi then Kudzi Nyamufukudza, especially in away games, that comfort providing hope for the invading green-and-white army as the minutes ticked away.

And, so, when Nyamupfukudza’s effort went home, just after the hour mark, a combination of both relief and optimism to even end the wretched Maglas curse swept through the CAPS United fans. However, their joy was short-lived when assistant referee Thomas Kusosa signalled there had been an offside infringement and referee Philani Ncube disallowed the effort.

The bedlam sparked by this decision, in which some hooligans took matters into their hands, saw a number of missiles being thrown onto the pitch with Kusosa the obvious target of their combined fury. The Gweru-based assistant referee was struck by one of the missiles and with the match officials being forced to seek shelter in the dressing rooms, and fearing for their safety, the match had to be called off.

Attacks on match officials, no matter how horrible their decision-making, should never be accepted and only on Saturday, Ghana’s 2018 World Cup dreams melted away in a blaze of controversy in Kampala when South African referee Daniel Bennet and his assistant somehow contrived to deny the Black Stars victory by ruling out a perfect late goal.

But, instead of manhandling the match officials, the Ghanaian football chiefs have asked FIFA to order a replay of that match and also called for Bennet and his assistants to be banned from the game. While that’s the culture domestic football should try and embrace, what is disturbing is that those who appoint the match officials for such explosive games, which include a back ground checks of the controversy they have been involved in, appear to be doing a very bad job of the whole thing.

For, in this instance, how did the ZIFA Referees Committee somehow appoint Kusosa for this match, given all the tension behind it, and his history in decisions that have led to the abandonment of such high-profile matches?

l Didn’t the appointing authorities consider the fact that, in May this year at Barbourfields, Highlanders officials wrote a protest letter asking for Kusosa to be removed from the panel of match officials who were set to handle their Battle of Zimbabwe showdown against Dynamos because they were unhappy he had controversially disallowed two of their efforts, in a game against Shabanie, which Bosso lost in the City of Kings?

l Given that Kusosa had been accused, just five months ago, of having appeared to favour Shabanie, by disallowing those two Bosso efforts at Barbourfields, wasn’t it too much of a gamble for the Referee Committee to then appoint him to handle such a high-profile match featuring the asbestos miners?

l Didn’t his mere appointment to be part of the cast of match officials for yesterday’s game provide doubts, in the camp of the opposition, that they were unlikely to be given a fair deal in a game where, just like in law, justice should not only be done but should be seen to have been done?

l Because Bosso officials and fans felt Kusosa had given them a raw deal against Shabanie Mine, and didn’t want him to be part of the officials to handle their match against Dynamos, the seeds of doubt sowed by such friction exploded into the mayhem that resulted in the same assistant referee being pelted by missiles when he allowed that goal by Christian Epoupa Ntouba to stand which Highlanders felt should have been disallowed for offside leading to the abandonment of that match in the first half.

l Didn’t the appointment of centre referee Philani Ncube to take care of yesterday’s match also sow seeds of doubt among some CAPS United fans who still remembered the events at Barbourfields in July 2013 when the same match official awarded them a penalty in a match against Bosso in the 21st minute only for him to be summoned by fourth official Bekezela Makeka to the touchline and, after deliberations, the referee changed his decision and gave Bosso a free-kick?

l Didn’t Ncube’s decision to allow a 71st minute effort by Highlanders to stand in a Bob@91 Super Cup semi-final between Bosso and CAPS United, while the Green Machine ‘keeper Victor Twaliki was seeking refugee from an assortment of missiles, also sow seeds of doubts, among some of the CAPS fans, of the fairness of the referee when it comes to them?

It’s sad yesterday’s game had to end in this farcical manner.