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EBSON “Sugar” Muguyo left huge footprints, on the football fields of South Africa in the ’70s, and turned himself into such an immortal at Kaizer Chiefs, he was recently honoured as one of the greatest 12 Amakhosi players of all-time.Muguyo shared that Golden Boot with his Chiefs’ teammate, the legendary Ace Ntsoelengoe, named in 2011 as South Africa’s greatest footballer ever, who was inducted in the United States Soccer Hall of Fame last year.

In the countdown to the 2010 FIFA World Cup, the BBC Sport ran a feature on Ntsoelengoe, dubbing him the greatest player that the football family around the globe never got a chance to see, his magic lost, forever, to the wall of enforced isolation that apartheid brought on South Africa.

It’s a measure of Muguyo’s brilliance that, at the peak of his athletic powers, he could not only walk in the same company with Ntsoelengoe, playing in the same Chiefs team, but he was also good enough, as was the case in 1976, to share the Golden Boot with the South African legend.

In two years time, the clock will mark the 40th anniversary of that remarkable year when Muguyo’s goal-scoring prowess, and all-round brilliance, held South Africa spellbound as he won the Golden Boot with 18 league goals.

Three years ago, Kick-Off magazine, in celebrating its 400th edition, named the Best XI foreign footballers, to have played in South Africa from 1994, when it published its first edition, and picked five Zimbabwean players, about half the number of those on its distinguished list, among the 11 stars.

Tinashe Nengomasha, Wilfred Mugeyi, the late Francis Shonhayi, Innocent Chikoya and John Mbidzo were the five Zimbabwean football stars who made it onto the Kick-Off Best Foreigners XI, among those who graced that country’s football fields since ’94.

From the time Muguyo first made a huge impact, about 40 years ago, right up to now, what is very clear is that Zimbabwean footballers have left their big mark on South African football and, since the turn of the millennium, every decent player who has emerged in our Premiership has been lured by the big money on the other side of the Limpopo.

Our contribution to South African football hasn’t only been limited, to what our players have done on the field, but we have also given our neighbours some of our best administrative football brains, over the past 20 years, and Rita Musekiwa, one of the finest officials we had when 53 Livingstone Avenue was about football, and not the politics of football, in the good old days when ZIFA House was a decent place before it was reduced to this shell where every creditor raids, with shocking regularity, to attach every piece of furniture that can be found there, was one of the administrators who went to South Africa to help SAFA onto its feet.

In June this year, Dream Team legend, Alexander “Mr Cool” Maseko, who also played in South Africa, was asked by a B-Metro journalist to name the person he considered the finest football administrator that he had ever worked with.

“I still remember a lady by the name Rita Musekiwa, who worked at ZIFA,” Maseko replied. “She was on the ball.”

The current spokesman of SAFA, Dominic Chimhavi, is also one of us, having spent years working in Harare as a sports journalist, notably at the old Parade magazine, before he decided to cross the Limpopo, in search of better challenges, and working himself up the ladder to be the voice of one of the biggest Football Associations on the continent.

IF WE COULD ALSO GET JUST ONE OF THEM

Our players, and administrators, have contributed, in a big way, to the cause of South African football, for a period extending more than four decades and, just imagine, if the football gods would change that one-way flow of talent across the Limpopo.

Imagine if we could get Danny Jordaan to come here and work, just for a year or so, as the chief executive of ZIFA, the rapid transformation that our national game will undergo, the feel-good breeze that will sweep into the game, the confidence, among the sponsors, that such an appointment will bring and the hope that we will all carry that tomorrow will be a better day?

Jordaan has weaved the magic, since he took over as SAFA president last year, but I guess a lot of you also know that this is a man who can work in the office, leading the secretariat, and just four years ago he was the chief executive of the Local Organising Committee that ran a very successful 2010 FIFA World Cup.

Just after his election, as SAFA president last September, Jordaan was asked to identify what he felt was the biggest problem that was stalking South African football and he said there was too much talk, and very little action.

“Those who are efficient will stay and those who aren’t will have to go — as we begin to move forward and implement our policies,” he told the SAFA staff at their first meeting.

“We have to deal with a number of issues, from national team coaches to financial reports — after we reported a R46 million loss. We need to come up with a turnaround strategy. We have to change the financial fortunes of the association and the time is now.”

When he took over, a year ago, SAFA’s finances were weighed down by a R46 million debt (about US$4,6 million) and, in just one year, Jordaan has turned it around and at the SAFA Congress last month, they reported a profit of R10 million.

ZIFA have been battling with a debt of between US$5 million and US$6 million, with no solution whatsoever in the past four years, and if this man can clear his organisation’s debts of US$4,6 million, and report a profit of about US$1 million, in his first year in charge, I think you have to give him the benefit of doubt that, given the challenge to sort out our financial mess, he would have done that without a blink of an eye.

Yes, the economies are different, but this is the same SAFA that was limping, U$4,6 million in the red, when he took over, which shows that even when you have an economy that is ticking, and sponsors ready to come and be your partners, you have to get it right in terms of the administrative aspects of your game.

Let’s not forget that SAFA lost ABSA, a very big partner for them, and they also lost Puma, their technical partner, just after Jordaan took over, but he promised that things would not only be stabilised but would be improved and, in just one year, he has done exactly that.

But Jordaan’s biggest success story, and something that local football fans would celebrate all-year long if it happened here, has been the way he has masterminded the turnaround of the country’s national teams.

All the national teams that have plunged into international competitions — Banyana Banyana, Under-20, Under-17 and Bafana Bafana — qualified for the finals of their CAF competitions, a first for South Africa since they came back into the international football fold.

And they didn’t just knock out Mickey Mouse teams — Bafana Bafana eliminated Nigeria from 2015 Nations Cup group, finishing unbeaten in the qualifiers, as they qualified for their final AFCON finals in six years.

The Under-20s knocked out Cameroon and their Under-17 team eliminated Egypt on their way to qualifying for the finals of their CAF Youth Championships and now their target is to finish, among the top four next year, and they would be playing at the FIFA Under-20 and Under-17 World Cups.

Imagine if our football could get someone like Jordaan, to run our association at 53 Livingstone Avenue, we wouldn’t be US$6 million in the red, and without a clue of how to get out of the mess, something that has been going on for four years, and could go for another four years, without a solution, until everything that has the name ZIFA, has been attached by creditors.

We would be putting a lot of emphasis on improving our national teams, like the revolution that has swept across South African football, including the Mighty Warriors, and not this current depressing scenario where all you get are ugly fights, including some very petty ones, between our chief executive and the leaders of women football.

If someone like Jordaan was the man running our football, we wouldn’t be making Mickey Mouse bids, to try and host Nations Cup finals, when we know that we don’t have the facilities to do so and, crucially, he would be advising the ZIFA board, and the government, that we don’t stand a chance, and therefore, we should not waste time, and financial resources, by bidding instead of jumping on the next plane to Zambia, Botswana and Egypt on a wild goose chase.

We wouldn’t be getting ZIFA board members being disrespected, and notified about a 2015 Nations Cup bid, after a commitment has been done by the chief executive and he has already travelled to Zambia, as was the case in our bid, to try and get our northern neighbours to come into bed with us.

We wouldn’t be making that embarrassing move to try and court Botswana, including going to Gaborone to persuade them to be our co-hosts, especially against a background where our western neighbours, just a few months ago, failed to get their government backing to host a smaller tournament like the COSAFA Cup.

We wouldn’t be blasting the media, as prophets of doom, for telling us that our 2015 Nations Cup bid was going to fail, when we even knew that we were going to fail, but we would rather be embracing them, as our partners, and promising to take their advice, in future, rather than labelling them as enemies.

The South Africans needed just one man to change it for them and, all we can do, is wait, wait for the rain that will never come.

A MESSAGE FROM ALOIS  BUNJIRA

The new South African Football Association chairman went into office with the association in debt, fast forward around a year later, they posted a R10m profit, plus new TV deals coming up alongside a new deal with Nike as technical sponsor.

South Africa qualified for the Africa Youth Championship under 17 tournament. South Africa qualified for the Africa Youth Championship Under-20 tournament. South Africa qualified for the Africa Nations Cup for women. South Africa senior national team qualified for AFCON with a match to spare.

We, on the other hand, were knocked out by Tanzania in the first round of preliminary matches, we have nothing to talk about as far as youth and women football is concerned.

And we hear some people still saying our football is better than South African football. Hanzi imari chete . . . really?

FROM OUR FRIENDS AT GEMAZO BLITZ

‘We have always known that ZIFA had no capacity to host even the Homeless World Cup — a four-a-side tournament that is played on the streets and watched for free, let alone the Nations Cup.

The beleaguered ZIFA were simply diverting the attention of the public when it announced that it would bid to host the 2017 Nations Cup.
CAF had insisted that the possible hosts should have hosted the Nations Cup in the past.

We have known that ZIFA were playing with the public’s emotions when they announced that FIFA would underwrite the association’s US$6 million debt. But for how long will ZIFA continue to trample on the football loving nation by lying through their teeth?

It’s a pity that masses, ironically the followers of football, are not the constituency that can pass a vote of no confidence on ZIFA but the football association has done more harm than good.’

TO THE WINNER GOES THE SPOILS

ZPC Kariba, unbeaten in their adopted home of Harare all season, are on the threshold of doing something special, tomorrow, by winning the Castle Lager Premiership title, in their first season in the top-flight league.

Any team, which beats the champions home and away, has a right to be champions and, exactly three years after Week 29 proved decisive, and swung the title race in Dynamos’ favour, the gods of football reminded Callisto Pasuwa that he was human, after all, with a decisive loss, in Week 29, against ZPC Kariba.

A ZPC Kariba triumph feels like a triumph, not only for them alone but for the other 14 teams in the Premiership, and their supporters, who have suffered under the domination of DeMbare in the past three seasons.

But this is a very strange game, indeed, and Falcao has scored once, in three months at Manchester United, Liverpool’s three forwards — Mario Balotelli, Rickie Lambert and Fabio Borini — are yet to score a Premier League goal in 998 minutes, Southampton are in second place in the championship race and Nigeria, the African champions, are out of the next tournament.

ZPC Kariba will win the league, of course they will win, that has been a very popular song in a country united by having grown weary of the DeMbare dominance, looking for a feel-good story of a David that floors Goliath or driven by either by hatred, or jealousy, of the Glamour Boys.

But, if they fail, they shouldn’t say no one told us that this is a very strange game.

And don’t call me a prophet a doom.

To God Be The Glory!
Come on United!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Di Mariaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!
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