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There were scores of broken hearts across town at Gwanzura, where FC Platinum’s majestic quest for league championship glory in their maiden season in the Premiership had come just short. And there were tears in Zvishavane.
But very few at Rufaro cared, as the winners took it all and the losers stood small, and after a four-year wait that had at times looked like an age, the “people’s team”, together with thousands of its fans packed inside the old stadium and millions elsewhere, could celebrate greatness.
Back in the days when DeMbare routinely won the league championship in the ’80s and ’90s, an achievement of this magnitude didn’t usually trigger the hysterical scenes that were exploding in every corner as Rufaro took a bow to the champions.
But the new millennium had brought new challenges for the people’s team and, amazingly, this was their only second league triumph since time replaced the starting digit of the years from one to two and that probably explained the hysterical scenes.
The following week, at the National Sports Stadium, Dynamos duly completed a league and cup double. But, after being outplayed for long periods by a determined Motor Action on a slippery pitch, the Mbada Diamonds Cup final, played in atrocious rainy conditions, could not match what had happened at Rufaro for beautiful sights and lovely sounds.
When the party ended at the giant stadium, we also waved goodbye to football, goodbye to an incredible season in which the domestic Premiership had bounced back in style, goodbye to a cast of new heroes who had emerged along the way and we all took a bow to Washington Arubi, the standout player of the year.
And, as quickly as the real football had ended, the politics took over and the beautiful headlines that had dominated the back pages were quickly replaced by the ugly ones mined from the poisoned and deeply divided football political fields of our country.
The beautiful pictures of players celebrating a goal and fans saluting in acknowledgement, which had until then dominated the back pages in a red-letter season for the domestic Premiership, now gave way to the appalling images of administrators.
The lovely pictures of coaches dishing out instructions and celebrating when it all went according to plan, now gave way to those grey and dark images of men tasked with running our game and, now and again, they were pouring venom in all directions.
It became a very long off-season, the negativity increased in intensity with each passing week, a game that had looked so beautiful just a few weeks earlier now turned into this very ugly thing and if you read some of the venomous threats, you would be forgiven to believe the world was coming to an end.
But, thank God, the real heroes of this game, the men who should dominate it, the men that people pay a certain price just to watch them in action, the men who leave lasting images in our minds with their wizardry, are coming back to play.
From tomorrow, the real deal effectively starts, right where it ended last year in a rainstorm during a Mbada Diamonds Cup final dominated by thunder and lightning, as a fresh domestic football season gets underway at the National Sports Stadium.
The NetOne Charity Shield opens the door for a new season and tomorrow we are back where it ended last year and, as fate will have it, it’s the two teams that closed the show last season — Dynamos and Motor Action — who will open the new show again.

Administrators Versus Players
And Coaches
Somehow, in this country, we have repeatedly painted administrators as the main football actors who should always dominate the big stage while the players can be relegated into the shadows.
And it’s very likely that our football leaders will be recognised by many people, if they took a walk in the First Street Mall, while few people will probably recognise rising FC Platinum forward, Donald “Dombo” Ngoma, if he walks in the same mall.
It’s not something that started recently but has been going on for years and, even when I was a primary school kid back in the days of my innocence in home sweet home Chakari, I knew Nelson Chirwa’s facial appearance better than legendary Hwange forward, Nyaro Mumba.
It’s the nature of our national game, and its an endless political minefield, that our leaders — even for no fault of their own — end up being the main players in a game that should be dominated by the artists who are supposed to be the real showmen.
It’s the eternal tragedy of our football and, because of that, we will never create our own little Messis in our national game because the focus is not on the men who are the true stars of this game.
While the South African media will go to all lengths to build the profile of Katlego Mphela, to such an extent that he will even be invited for trials at Glasgow Celtic, we belittle the importance of Nyasha Mushekwi, the guy who has replaced him as the main target man at Sundowns, even though he is one of us.
This week Mushekwi scored an incredible goal, connecting the ball at full stretch in a show of great athleticism, but we didn’t give him the due credit that he deserved for such a wonderful goal. Why?
Because we are not obsessed, as the media, with the job of creating our own heroes and superheroes and the stories we would rather carry about him are the negative stuff because they suit the agenda that we love the most as Zimbabweans — Pull Him Down Syndrome.
Little Khama Billiat is a magician, as far as I can see, and he scored two goals for Ajax Cape Town this week, the second a product of pure class as he controlled with the deftest of touches and then, effortlessly, lobbed the ball home, all in one extra-ordinary movement.
But his story didn’t make the headlines here, as much as it did in South Africa, even though he is first and foremost a Zimbabwean whose rise into a genuine football star should cheer the spirits of the people here more than it does those who are South Africans.
Tapuwa Kapini, our national goalkeeper, was mobbed like a pop star by delirious Amazulu fans after his heroic performance in the penalty shootout in their Nedbank Challenge Cup tie.
The beautiful images were all over SuperSport and, given his status as our number one ’keeper, you would have expected us to celebrate Kapini’s fine hour with the media playing a very prominent role in such a celebration.
But, as you probably saw, the response from the local media was muted because we are slowly drifting away from seeing players as the real heroes and newsmakers in this game because our focus is now concentrated on what is happening in our boardrooms.
Yes, there are stories coming from the boardrooms that need to be told and it’s the media’s role to do that but, at the same time, there is need to remember that Denver Mukamba’s talents also need to be celebrated because the real deal are the players.
Last weekend the Premier Soccer League clubs held their annual meeting in Harare and if they had chosen to hold it at Rufaro and invited the fans to come and be witnesses to that indaba, for free, I doubt if they would have attracted more than 20 people into the stadium.
It was a key meeting because it had an eventual impact on the fans with decisions being made on what should be the minimum gate charge for Premiership games this season.
But, even if the league’s leadership dangled a carrot and promised any member of the public, who would come as an observer to their meeting at Rufaro, a free lunch that day, I still doubt if they would have attracted more than 20 people to the stadium.
Just change the characters a bit and, instead of the administrators who were at the PSL annual meeting, replace them with players and invite the fans to come and watch a pre-season match between Dynamos and Monomotapa at Rufaro and you will get a good crowd PAYING to come into the stadium.
That is the power of the player and that is the reason why the face of world football today is not the men who lead the global game at Fifa House in Zurich but it’s Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney.
At least, thank God, the real heroes of this game, the men who should dominate it, the men that people pay a certain price just to watch them in action, the men who leave lasting images in our minds with their wizardry, are coming back to play.
Tomorrow, the real deal gets underway once again.

A Caf That Has Lost Its Way
I have always expected the worst from Caf, under Issa Hayatou, because from the very day that he robbed us of our right to host the 2000 Nations Cup, as punishment for exercising our right to vote for Sepp Blatter, this guy and his men have been enemies of Southern African football.
You probably know by now Hayatou’s promise that the whole of Africa would deliver its votes, en-bloc, to the then Uefa president, Lennart Johansson, the Swede, who was battling Blatter for the Fifa presidency in 1998.
Hayatou had been promised that he would replace the Swede, as Fifa president, in 2002.
But something happened in Kigali, Rwanda, when Blatter flew into Africa to ask for support and the entire East and Southern African nations, after years of being treated as second class constituencies by a Caf leadership that favoured West and North Africa, staged a rebellion against Hayatou.
Johansson was embarrassed in the first round and it became clearly evident that Africa had rebelled and a humiliated Hayatou punished the rebels with Zimbabwe the first casualty after the rights to host the 2000 Nations Cup were taken away amid foolish claims that we were not ready.
Burkina Faso, which had hosted the ’98 Nations Cup finals, probably needed 10 more years to upgrade its facilities to reach the standards of the National Sports Stadium, Rufaro and Barbourfields. But the Burkinabe were given their chance, despite their poor facilities, and we were shown the red card.
Hayatou and his men didn’t support South Africa’s candidature to host the 2006 World Cup, which the Rainbow Nation controversially and narrowly lost to Germany, because they still had issues to sort with a rebellious Southern Africa.
Even when Fifa decided that the 2010 World Cup would be held in Africa and it was clear that South Africa was the only country on the continent with the capacity to stage such a massive tourney, the Caf madmen still encouraged Morocco to bid.
Of course, they were humiliated again, as Mzansi triumphed but while time has helped heal some of the wounds, they will always hit back now and again and the latest directive for FC Platinum to stop using Mandava for their Champions League games is yet another jab from those guys.
The same Caf, which gave FC Platinum the greenlight to host Green Mamba of Swaziland at Mandava in the same Champions League tournament, somehow now finds fault with that arrangement simply because a very rich team from North Africa, El-Merreikh, is coming here.
Has Caf become today’s version of Animal Farm where all animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others?
If Caf is right that Zvishavane cannot host Champions League matches because there are no suitable hotels for visiting teams and officials in the city, does that imply they didn’t care about Green Mamba simply because they are a poor Southern African team?
If the lodges that we have stayed in West Africa, over the years, disguised as three-star hotels and certified by Caf to host visiting teams are standard accommodation, then I think the Runde Lodge in Zvishavane, when compared to those lodges, is a four-star hotel and should host El-Merreikh.
Now and again teams from this part of the continent have been ill-treated in West and North Africa and repeated complaints to Caf have been thrown into the dust bins because the organisation doesn’t care about us.
Even the Warriors, in their latest trip to Burundi, were ill-treated and thrown into a downtown lodge, disguised as a hotel, which would have made the old Queens Hotel in Harare look like Hotel California, as described by the Eagles in their classic hit song, but our complaints were thrown into the dustbin because Caf doesn’t care.
They will fight, tooth and nail, to ensure that FC Platinum do not enjoy their home advantage because the eight goals that the Zvishavane side scored in the preliminary round sent shock waves across the continent.
It will be a very sad story if FC Platinum don’t get the chance to play their Champions League opponents in Zvishavane considering the huge investment they made in refurbishing their stadium, into a modern facility, all because they wanted their community to watch some of Africa’s best teams and players at their doorstep.
We have to keep praying that El-Merreikh can agree to a deal with FC Platinum to stay in Masvingo, because that is the only way out, because we can write hundreds of emails to Caf in protest but, just like what they did when Memory Mucherahowa was headbutted in Abidjan 14 years ago, they will throw them into the dust bin.

Take A Bow For Chelski Guys
In the sports bar in Chitungwiza where I watched the Chelsea/Napoli Champions League tie on Wednesday night, there were about 50 people glued to the television set and following the unfolding drama at Stamford Bridge.
I’m not a Chelski fan but I am one of those guys who believe in the values of the English Premiership so much that, given a choice, I usually support the devils I know from the backyard when it comes to Champions League matches.
So there I was that night, backing Chelski all the way, and looking to find some consolation for a Premiership that has charmed me so much for the better part of my adult life.
And, when the fourth Chelski goal went in, the whole bar erupted into a frenzy and I said, damn, whether you like it or not, the people here really like their English football.
So much has been said about Didier Drogba, John Terry and Frank Lampard, about them being over the hill, about them needing to give room for young stock and how they have become a cancer that is eating away the spirit of the Blues.
Some have blamed them for the sacking of AVB, the young Portuguese coach who promised so much at Porto but fell flat in spectacular fashion in the big league of England.
AVB tried to get rid of the old guard and while his vision might have been right, he probably didn’t handle the transition well and this created boardroom disharmony and led to the poor performances that we saw coming from Chelski.
Ironically, on Wednesday night, it was the old guard — thrown into the deep end by Roberto Di Matteo — who provided the inspiration that guided Chelski to one of their greatest European nights with a comeback show that was as full of character as it was of style.
“Chelsea’s old guard may not be the force of old, but they were not a problem here, either. Drogba scored, Terry scored, Lampard hammered away at the coal face — and then scored, as he so often does: 13 goals and counting again this season,” wrote Martin Samuel, that super sportswriter for The Daily Mail in England.
“The trophy is probably beyond them — then again, many said that of this tie — and it may be the last time the senior service pass this way, if a top-four finish is not their destiny, but to use an old dressing-room exhortation, they left nothing out there.
“The end of an era? We shall see. Not when the veterans can hit this peak. It was a flashback to see this group, united and fighting to its last gasp. On a night when some quarters of English football took a header off the deep end, it truly was an inspiring sight.”
The average age of the Chelski starting line-up that day was 28,4 years. Age is nothing but a number and, after being paired by Benfica in the quarter-finals, you can now feel probably destiny is in Chelski’s favour and, given the unpredictability of knockout games, they can fancy their chances.
A Dream Final against Jose Mourinho’s Real Madrid? Possibly! Or a semi-final against Barcelona? Probably!
For all the challenges that Chelski have faced this season, I have always felt they play Barca better than any team in the English Premiership and maybe, after being robbed in that Champions League semi-final by Barca at Stamford Bridge two years ago, they could get their chance for revenge. Just maybe!

Poor, Poor Manchester United
We are out of the Europa League, having been outplayed by Athletic Bilbao, and you have to say we deserved our fate because we have been horrible in Europe this season.
The rivals have been rubbing salt into the wounds but it comes with the terrain and you pay a certain prize for being sloppy and we deserve all the hammering we are getting.
Two of my Facebook pals posted something that made interesting reading.
Yukon Mtetwa: Manchester United, Out of FA Cup — Lost 2-1 to Liverpool, Out of Carling Cup — Lost 2-1 to Crystal Palace, Out of the Champions League — Lost 2-1 to Basel, Out of the Europa League — Lost 2-1 to Athletic Bilbao. Actually, I feel lucky not 2 be 1 of their fans.
Bla Eddie: Bhora reChitatu rakaramba, remadzimai eChina raramba! Zvimwe mave kuda reChishanu (Johanne Masowe weChishanu). Endai munobhabhatidzwa ikoko maDevils.
Come on United!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Chicharitooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

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