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MaBlanyo has just one test to pass, in Botswana tomorrow, to complete his transformation from a kindergarten coach to an established coach and he knows that the last assignment is always the hardest. If he passes the examination tomorrow, in my little book, it will be the biggest transformation by a local coach in the history of our game and one of the best stories ever written by a local gaffer.

Sharuko on Saturday 

FIVE years ago, Lloyd Chigowe’s ambitions to complete his transformation from a coach, who was largely an academy mentor, into one who could be trusted to take charge of a Premiership side, lay in ruins.

Just four games into the 2019 season, Chigowe was jobless.

He had just been fired by Dynamos after losing THREE of his four league matches in a miserable run, which included three straight losses.

That horror run of results included two home losses to Hwange and Herentals, and a 0-2 defeat at the hands of Chicken Inn in Bulawayo,

Chigowe had been recruited towards the end of the previous season, amid the chaos of both fear and confusion, as DeMbare faced the real possibility of being relegated.

Two wins in the final six games he was in charge brought the rainbow of relief as the Glamour Boys escaped the chop and finished six points clear of Nichrut who were in the last relegation slot.

But, the opening four games of the new season provided a reality check for Chigowe and his employers and, after just four games, the lanky gaffer with probably the craziest nickname in world football, was gone.

He is widely known as MaBlanyo, whatever that means, even though my colleague, the legendary Charles “CNN” Mabika, says it’s a bastardised version of MaBlazo.

Back in those days, there was something that was just not convincing about MaBlanyo.

Maybe it was his lanky frame, his casual way of dressing, his face, which appeared to portray him as a man pleading for mercy all the time, or a combination of all this.

But, there was always this something, whatever it was, which did not seem to provide the assurance that he was authoritative enough to guide a club like Dynamos to success.

This is a game in which Vicente del Bosque was fired by Real Madrid in 2003 because, with his heavy moustache and a rugged face which was seemingly allergic to smiling, he was considered not cool enough to fit into the club’s project of having poster boys.

His contract was not renewed just 48 hours after he had led them to yet another La Liga title, his second during a spell in which he also won two European Cups (today’s Champions League), a Super Cup and a FIFA Club World Cup.

Ahead of the game against Herentals on April 18, 2019, MaBlanyo told the media that his face was not the most popular in Harare because of the back-to-back defeats to Hwange and Chicken Inn.

Social media was brutal and MaBlanyo’s face was transformed, through photoshop, into an image of helplessness, hopelessness, carelessness, a lifeless and hapless figure whose recruitment was, at best, a joke, and at worst, a calamity.

That’s what failure does in the brutal world of sport, the attacks are relentless and MaBlanyo found himself walking alone after the Dynamos bosses decided he was dragging them down the wrong path.

It was a difficult time for MaBlanyo and a few months later he emerged as the favourite to take over a struggling ZIFA Central Region Division One side, Real BVM, as he looked for some redemption.

It was quite telling that a man, who a few months ago had been tasked with helping a poor Dynamos win their first league championship in five years, was now trying to get a job to coach a struggling Division One side.

He didn’t get the job, for one reason or another, and he even turned his attention to Botswana where he was one of the coaches who applied for, and were interviewed, by Tafic FC.

MaBlanyo did not get that job either.

But, today, five years later, he finds himself in that country, not as a man who came looking for a job at such an unfashionable side as Tafic but as a coach who is about to write his finest story.

You have to love fate, it has a unique way of surprising us, it has a way of humbling us and it has a way of helping us find our redemption in places, and on occasions, we never dreamt about.

If you had told MaBlanyo, five years ago, that he would return to Botswana, not as an unemployed fellow, with a tattered reputation in the wake of his failure at DeMbare, looking for a job, but as a man about to celebrate his finest hour, it’s very likely he would have dismissed it all as a sick joke.

FOR MABLANYO, THIS COULD BE HIS FINEST HOUR

But, here he is today, a man who, for the first time in his coaching career, has seen some real love being extended towards him by fans who have finally embraced him as a proper football coach.

This is a man who is just one game away from completing the biggest transformation in his coaching career and making the biggest statement to answer all the critics who have stalked and doubted him all this time.

I am one of those critics.

I will not hide away from the fact that I doubted him, in more ways than one, and I wasn’t even secretive about it because I am someone who stands by his words.

And, even on the occasion that they backfire, I remind myself that I am just an ordinary human being who, just like everyone else, is bound to make a mistake here and there.

I have never regarded myself as a superman and those who are close to me know that I keep telling them that I’m just an ordinary fellow from Chakari who was blessed by God to become a journalist.

They told me in those gold mining fields, back in the days when I was just a little boy, that the truth shall always set you free.

They also told me that nothing, absolutely nothing, beats humility and if you are humble, the rest will fall into place.

I will not join a bandwagon simply because everyone seems to be on it and that is why I refused to be part of those who have elevated Michael Nees to greatness on the back of just two draws in his first two matches.

I have said it’s a fair return and an encouraging start but this is not the stuff of legends to the extent that we have to start labelling him the coach who will take us to the Promised Land.

MaBlanyo has just one test to pass, in Botswana tomorrow, to complete his transformation from a kindergarten coach to an established coach and he knows that the last assignment is always the hardest.

If he passes the examination tomorrow, in my little book, it will be the biggest transformation by a local coach in the history of our game and one of the best stories ever written by a local gaffer.

Please, don’t tell me that this is just the Confederation Cup, a second-tier CAF inter-club competition and far away from the real world where the real Dynamos used to take as their playground in the Champions League.

Let’s put everything into context and we will see that MaBlanyo would have done something special, not only for himself and his CV, but also for his team and our club football, if he passes the test tomorrow.

The Glamour Boys had disappeared from the continental club football scene for a decade in which they became a symbol of both failure and depreciation as they wandered in the wilderness searching for their soul.

Without them, and their pedigree on the continent, we struggled to make an impression in these competitions.

If anyone had told us, a few years ago, that it would take MaBlanyo to give us the best shot of getting one of our clubs back in the group stages of the CAF inter-club tournaments, chances are that we would have mocked that person as a madman.

If we had run a poll for fans to predict the coach who would take us closer to a return to the group stages of these tournaments, it’s likely that the familiar names would have cropped up: Mhofu, Mapeza, Antipas, Chitembwe, Pasuwa.

I will tell you that if we had 10 million replies to that poll, not even one person, including MaBlanyo’s family members, would have mentioned his name on that list.

Those are the odds that MaBlanyo has battled to get this far and that is a very special story.

Why it will be very special for me is the fact that he would be the first coach in this country who would have guided one of our clubs to the group stages of the CAF inter-club tournaments without the benefit of playing even one game at home.

That is huge because in football home is everything.

To imagine his men have played three games, which is 270 minutes or four-and-half hours, all of it away from home, and they are yet to concede a goal, is something very special.

MaBlanyo is clearly not the most fashionable coach even though, in those blue suits he is wearing now, he looks better than when his dress code, five years ago, was the odd tracksuit top, a shirt and a pair of trousers, without any match at all.

He appears to be settling into the big time and with that he now has the understanding that his new role requires a certain way of presenting himself because that all contributes to how he is viewed as an individual.

But, most importantly, he has found a way to grind results and that is all that matters in this game.

He appears to have borrowed a leaf from the legendary Mhofu with his biggest strength being in his defence, which has been giving very little away, and the odd goal scored is usually enough to win a match.

MaBlanyo knows that this assignment is not over and, with nothing to lose, Orapa are likely to go on a kamikaze approach and throw everything at his men.

It will be sad if he loses now, after everything he has done to build his team from the ashes of that poor run which cost Genesis Mangombe his job, to take them within touching distance of a place in the Confederation Cup group stages.

It will be a beautiful story if he completes the task and I want to tell him, loud and clear, that I am singing in his corner this weekend because he is representing my country.

It’s something we never thought we could write about MaBlanyo just five years ago but that’s the beauty of sport, in general, and football, in particular.

Tenderara MaBlanyo!

To God Be The Glory!

Peace to the GEPA Chief, the Big Fish, George Norton, Daily Service, Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse and all the Chakariboys still in the struggle.

Come on Dynamos!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MaBlanyoooooooooooooooooooooo!

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You can also interact with me on the ZTV football programme, Game Plan, where I join the legendary Charles “CNN” Mabika on Wednesdays