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Grace Chingoma Senior Sports Reporter—
THE Warriors’ successful 2017 African Cup of Nations campaign has turned them into star attractions for corporate partners with the first major deal, a $250 000 sponsorship package from NetOne set to be unveiled in Harare today. The Warriors have become hot property after they became the only Southern African national football team to qualify for the Nations Cup finals in Gabon next month.

Although it has taken time for them to start reaping benefits that come with their success, the corporate partners are now lining up in their corner ahead of their Gabon adventure.

The Herald, which exclusively revealed on Monday that ZIFA have secured a partner for the Warriors’ Gabonese excursion and who will also meet some of the Association’s commitments, can reveal that a number of sponsors — including some based in South Africa — are now queuing to partner Callisto Pasuwa and his men in Gabon.

Kwese Media, the new player shaking the sports broadcasting landscape in Africa by laying the foundation to challenge established broadcasters like SuperSport are also eyeing a possible partnership with the Warriors.

The company has already partnered COSAFA and ZIFA president Philip Chiyangwa’s stunning triumph to become the leader of the regional football grouping could open doors for a possible partnership between the Association and Kwese Media Group.

A number of kit sponsors, including Kappa, have also been exploring the possibility of partnering the Warriors in Gabon and also establishing long-term deals. ZIFA announced recently that their marriage with their kit sponsors, Joma, had collapsed although the Association still retains the company as one of their sponsors, on its official website, as they finalise the disengagement process.

Joma are also retaining ZIFA as one of their partners on the company’s official website. This morning, ZIFA and NetOne will unveil a package for the Warriors and the Association a day before the team start their camp for the African Cup of Nations.

Crucially, for ZIFA, the sponsorship comes at a time when corporate assistance has been elusive due to the bad image of the domestic football’s governing body. ZIFA had to rely on the benevolence of businessman Wicknell Chivayo, who single-handedly funded the Warriors, firstly paying off Belgian coach Tom Saintfiet, who was owed $180 000, after his short flirtation with the Warriors.

FIFA had threatened to disqualify the Warriors from the 2022 World Cup if ZIFA had failed to pay the amount that was due to Saintfiet by the end of January this year. It would have been disastrous for another generation of the country’s footballers had FIFA carried out their threat given that the world football governing body also expelled the Warriors from the 2018 World Cup qualifiers.

Chivayo also committed himself to pay Pasuwa’s $7 000 monthly salary while also meeting some of the players’ expenses and boosting their morale through shopping trips.

There have been calls for ZIFA to nail down corporate sponsors and this morning Chiyangwa and NetOne acting chief executive Brian Mutandiro will unveil their partnership in the capital.

The deal will be under NetOne’s Fusion brand. “The deal will cover our Warriors campaign in Gabon next month and the boys will be fully catered for during their campaign and we hope this will be a major boost for the boys when they fly our national flag at the African Cup of Nations.

“It will also give us a major sponsor, as an Association, for our activities next year and we are happy that we have moved in the right direction and our football will get a major facelift,” said Chiyangwa.

NetOne, who have always been football’s all-weather friend, are in an aggressive drive to become a big player on the local market where they have stiff competition from Econet and Telecel.

NetOne rescued the Warriors campaign when they chartered a plane for the team at the eleventh hour after the team had failed to secure seats in commercial flights on time and risked being disqualified had they not fulfilled the last qualifying match against Guinea.

And the mobile company will be hoping to reap huge rewards as they go into a partnership with local football. Mobile phone companies have been major players in the sponsorship of football around the world, but their presence in local football has been peripheral.

However, that is now set to change after the Warriors ended 10 years of waiting for a return to the Nations Cup after a dominant campaign which saw them win their ticket to Gabon with a game to spare. Pasuwa’s men defied the odds as they qualified ahead of odds-on favourites Guinea whose campaign was crippled by back-to-back defeats to Swaziland.