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Grace Chingoma Senior Sports Reporter

HARARE City Football Club are ready to play in the National League that is expected to begin this season with 16 teams.

The council-owned side was relegated from the Premier Soccer League last season after exactly 10 years in top-flight football.

The Sunshine Boys were relegated together with fellow council side Bulawayo City and prisons sides Tenax and WhaWha.

These four clubs are now expected to be part of the inaugural ZIFA National League that will start this season. The new feeder league will provide slots to the top-flight league promotion.

Harare City had been omitted from the ZIFA Northern Region Division One programme.

They were not included in the fixtures programme that was released early this year.

But the former Chibuku Super Cup champions might have found the perfect home as they seek to regain their Premiership status.

The relegated teams are expected to join the top four teams from the four regions namely Northern Region, Southern Region, Eastern and Central Region.

ZIFA have since invited the top three teams from each region to be part of the inaugural league in line with Section 10 of the ZIFA constitution.

ZIFA spokesperson, Xolisani Gwesela, said the clubs are expected to confirm by the end of this week whether they will be part of the inaugural league.

And Harare City chairman, Alois Masepe, yesterday said they are good to go as they await further instructions from the mother-body.

“We accept the offer if it comes; we have no problem with that. We await the ZIFA Implementation Matrix,” said Masepe.

Harare City are also still interested in playing in the top-flight league.

“If there is a team that is financially crippled in the Premier Soccer League and wants to dispose of their franchise, we will think about it,” he said.

“We are not a team masquerading as a club. We are a club with structures, with women’s teams from the Under-16s up to a team that is in the Super League as well as junior teams starting from the Under-10 up to Under-20.

“Of course, the flagship team was the Premier Soccer League side which was unfortunate to be demoted. But that is not only the team that we have. We are a club and well-structured,” said Masepe.

Despite the financial challenges the club faced last season, and the subsequent exodus of players, Masepe believes the team will survive the storm.

“On the technical side, we lost our head coach Taurai Mangwiro, who is now coaching in Botswana, but the other coaches are still there.

“Regarding the players, some players we feel are not Division One material will be placed elsewhere within the PSL clubs, either through loans or selling them.

“But there are other players that are still being honed by the club, like the youngsters who were signed under the PSL junior quota, we will retain these,” said Masepe.

He feels the National League is a step in the right direction and it was long overdue.

“The National League will narrow the gap between the PSL and Division One teams. It is a necessary rung which will provide capacity testing for the clubs so that clubs don’t experience financial shock when they are promoted into the top-flight league. The new league will also improve the quality of players,” he said.

Many of Harare City players have indicated they are not willing to play lower-tier football. Most of the players whose contracts have expired are currently hunting for new clubs in the Premiership.

Defender Hastings Chapusha, who has been captain of the club for the past few seasons, has found a new home at South Africa’s JDR Stars. Chapusha penned an emotional farewell to the club at the weekend.

“It’s the end of a chapter, not the book. I had an incredible six years at Harare City Football Club and have made some lifelong friends that now feel like family.

“Thank you for the past years we have been together. We went through ups and downs together and your support meant everything to me.”

Harare City have flirted with relegation in the last few seasons but their highlight during their decade of Premiership football was winning the Chibuku Super Cup twice.

“Having the chance to win the Chibuku Super Cup and the honour of being a captain of this club is something I will forever keep in my heart. I have always been 100 percent focused and committed on doing everything I could for this club,” said Chapusha.

The 26-year-old, who is a product of the Sunshine Boys development, singled out Moses Chunga as one of the coaches that shaped his career after giving him a breakthrough into professional football at a tender age.

“Special mention to Moses ‘Bambo’ Chunga for his trust and guidance in the early stages of my Premier League career at City, which gave me the confidence and platform to showcase what I can do.

“Not forgetting the Harare City development coaches, who played a bigger role to help me get promoted to the first team.”