LUIS Suarez did not bite an opponent just once. Neither did he do it only twice. He did it three times and, the treble was delivered, of all places, on the grand stage that the World Cup provides.But football found a way to rehabilitate Suarez and, after he bit Otman Bakkal in Holland, which earned him a seven-match ban during his days at Ajax Amsterdam, he was still able to strike a big money move to Liverpool.

His tendency to bite opponents, which borders on cannibalism, resurfaced at the Reds but, even after he bit Branislav Ivanovic, the game found a way to rehabilitate him and, on his return from a lengthy suspension, saw his pay cheque being improved to a cool £200 000 a week.

When Suarez sunk his teeth into the shoulders of Italian defender, Giorgio Chiellini, in Brazil, it effectively shattered Uruguay’s chances of going a step further than their fourth-place at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa and ended his career at Liverpool. But it didn’t bring the curtain down on his football career, the game that had given him a reprieve in Holland and England wasn’t ready to dump its mad genius, and Barcelona, a bigger club than Liverpool, came knocking on the door and handed him a five-year deal.

He will earn US$342 000 a week at Barca, where he will be the fourth highest paid player at the club, and soon he will be back in action, will score goals, probably lots of them, and football will forget about his madness in Brazil, embrace him as the genius that he is and life will go on.

Suarez isn’t the only football superstar, who carries a baggage of controversy, and Zinedine Zidane, for all his genius, had a volatile temper and, twice at the World Cup, in ’98 and 2006, he was sent off for attacking his opponents, including famously slamming his head into the chest of Marco Materazzi in the semi-finals in 2006.

Eric Cantona attacked a Crystal Palace fan with a karate kick that turned him into an outcast and sent him into isolation, from football, for a considerable length of time but when Manchester United fans were asked in 2011 to vote for their greatest players of all-time, the enigmatic Frenchman came second in the poll to Ryan Giggs and was feted as a better player than George Best, Bobby Charlton, Paul Scholes and Cristiano Ronaldo.

Rodreck Mutuma has shown us, in the past few days, that he has a short fuse, he has huge holes in his temperament, he has serious problems when it comes to controlling his emotions and it doesn’t matter, does it, that it’s a situation that concerns an opponent, as was the case with Obey Gada, or a teammate, as was the case with his skipper Murape Murape in that training ground bust-up.

Mutuma isn’t as talented as Suarez, for goodness sake he failed to make the grade at modest Bloemfontein Celtic in Super Diski, and it’s usually an indictment on one’s career when you find yourself being told by such a club that boy you aren’t good enough and, worse still, you don’t have the goals to back your argument.

He played more than 11 hours of football in league action for Celtic and scored just two goals at an average of a goal after every five-and-half hours, he didn’t get a goal in the MTN 8 and didn’t get any in the Nedbank Cup and in 802 minutes of action for Siwelele, across all platforms, his return was just two goals.

It’s not surprising, really, that he was also rejected by Moroka Swallows after the Dube Birds had offered him a chance to return to Super Diski this year.

Mutuma’s best goal-return in the domestic Premiership in a season was just a dozen goals, in 2011, and incredibly, it somehow was still good enough to win him a Golden Boot race that should have been nullified for being an insult for what these awards should stand for because of the lack of goals in that campaign.

The Prince isn’t a latter day Shackman Tauro, may the good soul of the immortal Mr Goals rest in eternal peace, isn’t a new millennium version of Gift M’pariwa, a natural goalscorer, he isn’t anywhere close to Agent Sawu, someone said they don’t make them this good anymore, and neither is he close to Zenzo Moyo.

But, for all the negatives that you can think of, when it comes to this footballer, it’s criminal to ignore the fact that, given he is one of those born without the talent to play football, Mutuma has worked incredibly hard to be where he is today, to lead the line in the Dynamos attack, and to even convince a South African club that he was good enough for them, forget about the fact that it turned out the other way.

It’s criminal to ignore the fact that he has, somehow, in his unique way, found a way to turn himself into a man, when it comes to his Dynamos career, who will always be there to stand up and be counted, on the big occasion, and before the vultures tear him apart, it’s important to remind them that it was his goal that won DeMbare the Mbada Diamonds Cup final in 2011 and it was his two goals, in the final, which powered the Glamour Boys to a 2-0 win as they retained the trophy the following season.

This year, in his short stint at Dynamos, he has already scored the winning goal against CAPS United and, inevitably, scored the winning goal in the league victory over Highlanders at Barbourfields.

THE PRINCE HAS GONE MAD, VERY MAD

Twice, in a space of two days, Mutuma was the common denominator in two fights, one an embarrassing one on a football field, and the other a depressing one with his captain at the team’s training ground and, against such a background, it’s difficult to find the extenuating circumstances to support his case, to lessen the burden of guilt that his actions exerted on his shoulders.

Twice, in a space of 48 hours, Mutuma has lit his fuse, lost his senses and ability to reason, chose the primitive way to resolve disputes by plunging into a fight, two of them to be precise, disgraced himself in the process by attracting needless publicity on the back pages and built a reputation as a rebellious bully, ready to fight anyone who crosses his path, at a time when he should be rehabilitating his career.

What Mutuma did, at Gwanzura and at Zimphos, is unacceptable and one is tempted to salute the Dynamos leadership, for all the shortcomings they have displayed in the past two weeks in failing to deal with the turbulence that shook their camp, for acting swiftly and suspending the forward because his madness has the potential of corroding the brand of the Glamour Boys.

Dynamos, by virtue of their size and their incredible success, have a responsibility to do things the right way, to provide the leadership all the time, and because they have converted themselves into the face of Zimbabwe club football, they carry a huge load, to always do things in an exemplary way.

They also have a responsibility to respect their corporate partners and none is bigger than BancABC, who pay the players their salaries, and it’s not a coincidence that, since they came on board to be the principal sponsors of the club, the Glamour Boys have been champions in each and every one of the seasons of their partnership.

Playing for Dynamos, by extension, also comes with carrying this heavy load where you will always be under the spotlight and that requires a certain responsibility, in handling that limelight, or things can deteriorate very fast.

You can’t fault the same media, whose blitz followed every golden moment penned by Mutuma, and turned him into a household name in this country, when they also unleash a blitz, to follow every mad moment that the same player has scripted for himself, including his bizarre pathetic imitation of becoming the next Arifonso “Mosquito” Zvenyika as a boxer of repute who can send opponents, and allies, crashing down with an uppercut.

Murape Murape, as captain of the biggest football club in the country, even carries a bigger moral responsibility, to behave in a manner that is exemplary all the time, and that he was involved in that training ground scuffle, no matter the level of intimidation that he might have been subjected too, or endured, is even more depressing than Mutuma’s flirtation with madness.

It’s easy to sympathise with Murape, he might be a cocky fellow who really gets into the nerves of his opponents, but he doesn’t have a history of fighting his teammates, during his lengthy career at Dynamos, and given the events at Gwanzura on Sunday, it’s easy to see that the real villain in all this is Mutuma.

But domestic football should not turn its back on Mutuma, should not cast him away into the wilderness, should not treat him as an outcast simply because he lost his senses this week, should not treat him as a villain simply because he chose to box and not to reason with those that disagreed with him and, in his daze, it didn’t matter whether they were teammates or opponents.

If this same game found a way to rehabilitate Suarez for biting, not one, not two but three opponents, including on the grand stage of the World Cup, forgave him for his indiscretion and even opened doors for him to join bigger and better teams, where he was guaranteed a big pay cheque, then it should be able to help Mutuma so that he gets to appreciate that he doesn’t need to fight all the time he has a disagreement with someone.

Uruguay didn’t turn its back on Suarez when he returned from the World Cup in disgrace, even though it was clear that his act of madness had cost the country a chance to try and win  the tournament — exactly 52 years after their last triumph in the same country — but he was embraced by a country that knew that its mad genius had messed up but, all the same, needed their love.

Because of that, Suarez has now come to acknowledge that he made a huge mistake to bite Chiellini, has now come out of his denial mode that his expulsion from the World Cup was all part of an international conspiracy against his small nation  of around three million people, and he has not only apologised publicly for his act of stupidity but has gone the extra mile to tell the world that he needs specialist help and has been getting such treatment to destroy the demons that turn him into a modern day Dracula.

If this is the same game that found a way to rehabilitate Cantona, after his karate kick on that Crystal Palace fan, and immortalise him as the second greatest Manchester United player of all-time, even putting him ahead of a gentleman like Bobby Charlton, the hero who walked away from a plane crash and became the engine around which the post-Munich Red Devils were built on their way to European Cup glory 10 years later, then it should have the heart to forgive Mutuma.

Yes, the Prince has gone mad, very mad, but that shouldn’t give people a ticket to destroy his career because, in all fairness, his double brawling act isn’t the worst thing that a footballer can do and we have seen worse things, from stars with bigger profiles, and this game has always extended an olive branch to them and helped them find a way back to the light.

DO WE HAVE A COMPETITIVE OR A POOR PREMIERSHIP?

The top two teams from last season’s championship race, Dynamos and Highlanders, lead the marathon again, at the completion of two thirds of the race, with 20 games played and only 10 remaining before the curtain comes down.

The defending champions have lost four games in 20, the same number they lost in 30 games last year, but they still lead the race and that they have dropped 24 points from four losses and six draws hasn’t really hurt their campaign that much, given that they are the team that is, as of now, setting the standards.

Two years ago, they lost just 21 points all season from three losses and six draws, as they raked up 69 points to be champions while Bosso, who only lost one match, all season, but they were beaten to the championship on goal difference.

Some will argue that this year’s championship has become tighter but when you have a team like FC Platinum replacing their coach Lloyd Mutasa because he has failed to attain certain targets set by the team, and you find that they are just five points adrift of the leaders, then maybe we should be tempted to believe that the race has become poorer rather than tighter.

FC Platinum have lost about half the 60 points they have played for, so far this season, but they sit in sixth place, tied on points with Hwange who are in fifth place, and they are only five points adrift of the leaders.

Buffaloes have lost 32 of the 60 points they have played for, so far this season, but somehow they find themselves in the top half of the table, in seventh place, and they are only eight points adrift of the leaders of the championship race.

Black Rhinos have lost 37 points, of the 60 points they have fought for so far this season, but they are only FOUR points from the team in eighth place, Chicken Inn, which means that they are probably just a win and draw away from the top half of the league despite their poor run.

Maybe the champions themselves, more than any other team, provides weight to the argument that our Premiership has become a poor show.

The Glamour Boys are top of the table but they have the poorest strike-force, after 20 games, in the top Eight, they have been outscored by Harare City (25), who are in 10th place, How Mine (21), in 11th place, Triangle (26), in 12th place, Shabanie Mine (22), in 13th place, and even Bantu Rovers (21), in 15th place.

Incredibly, after 20 games of the season, the championship leaders have only scored more goals than just two teams — Chiredzi United (13 goals) and Black Rhinos (11 goals)  — and those teams in 14th and 16th places on the table.

Of course, defence can win you championships, and once again the Glamour Boys find themselves leading the way in that area of the game, tying ZPC Kariba as the two teams with the best defences so far in the league, but FC Platinum, for all the under-achievement that has stalked them and led to the decision to part ways with Mutasa, have only conceded just four more goals.

Last year the Glamour Boys needed just 54 points to win the championship, they shaved 15 points from their tally in the previous season but still did enough to be crowned champions, and they need 18 from the 30 remaining points to get to that tally but whether that would be enough remains to be seen.

I may be wrong but I think the domestic Premiership isn’t getting tighter but, rather, it has become poorer.

H-METRO SAID PASUWA ISN’T THE RIGHT CHOICE, AND THEY ARE RIGHT

Our sister newspaper, H-Metro, declared in an editorial this week that they felt Zifa’s decision to name Callisto Pasuwa as the coach of the national Under-23 team and, by extension, the interim coach of the Warriors, was a wrong one, especially at a time when the focus for the man who gets this job should be to look for fresh talent to build a new team.

It’s easy to understand their argument that giving someone who has a full-time job at Dynamos, which is even more demanding than coaching the Warriors given the intensity of the scrutiny week in and week out, was not the best decision for an organisation that wants to start afresh with the national team.

One thing certain is that Pasuwa won’t have the time to devote to the national cause because he has so much on his plate at Dynamos and, at a time when we need someone who can look at all the four corners of the country for fresh talent, he isn’t suitable for this job.

But, then, we don’t make the decisions and you wonder what those who make those decisions would have considered because, if they are really serious about a new journey, they needed someone who is not attached to any assignment, who works full-time on the job, who won’t be distracted by the league campaign.

Yes, H-Metro, you have made your name publishing those juicy stories and stunning pictures but you got it right on this one.

The problem, as you know, no one listens, no one cares, because all they see are shadows of people fighting them.

To God Be The Glory!
Come on United!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Chicharitoooooooooooooooooooo!
Text Feedback — 0772545199
WhatsApp Messenger — 0772545199
Email — [email protected]
Skype — sharuko58

Like my new Facebook page, ROBSON SHARUKO JOURNALIST, follow me on Twitter @Chakariboy, interact with me on Viber and on ZBC’s weekly television football magazine programme, GamePlan on Monday nights, or read my material in The Southern Times.

You Might Also Like

Comments

Take our Survey

We value your opinion! Take a moment to complete our survey