No tears for ‘fired’ Mutasa
Mutasa had been booted upstairs and Biggie “Nzou” Zuze had been appointed interim Dynamos coach.
The news was not shocking at all considering DeMbare’s horrific start to the season and Mutasa’s strained relationship with Zuze.
Yours Truly was not surprised either to hear that goalkeepers’ coach Zondai Nyaungwa had been fired.
If there is a guy who led Mutasa down the garden path, it can only be this guy called Zondie.
He is said to have used his proximity to Mutasa to settle personal scores with players such as Denver Mukamba and Lincoln Zvasiya, to mention but two.
Next time you hear Denver talking about some people whispering lies into Mutasa’s ears just think of the man who used to be DeMbare’s goalkeepers’ coach until early last week.
Mutasa and Nyaungwa had forged an alliance that sidelined Zuze, who had to be content with setting up cones and shouting tough luck when players got their lines wrong.
Take it from me, Nzou had very little technical input and never had Mutasa’s trust.
When he left for Warriors duty, Mutasa would leave the training programme with Zondie, yet Nzou was the second in command.
Observers rightly questioned why Mutasa had recommended that Zuze be brought in as his assistant when he did not believe in the man.
My input was and still is that Zuze turned out to be more than what Mutasa had bargained for.
The “fired” Dynamos coach has a history of moving around with bald headed assistants who would always say yes to everything he said and would resign when he got fired.
At FC Platinum, Mutasa was fired and Ralph Kawondera, who had been earmarked to be interim coach, walked away arguing that he could not backstab his friend.
But unlike the yes men that Mutasa was used to working with, Zuze often disagreed with his boss and in doing so made himself the target of Nyaungwa’s machinations.
Mutasa made his bed, he has to lie in it — crying or not crying.
He went against his bosses and sent Mukamba packing, he changed what used to work in terms of off the field rituals and believed Nyaungwa’s gossip ahead of Zuze’s technical advice.
Mutasa is a good guy but I am not crying with him on this one, he was hoisted by his own petard.
How Dynamos will do business with Zuze in charge is open to speculation but what is clear is that the man the DeMbare bosses badly want is Kallisto Pasuwa.
The DeMbare fans always want him back even though they often accused Pasuwa of playing boring football.
However, it looks like the return of Pasuwa won’t happen until Keni Mubaiwa is removed from the position of club president and Solomon Sanyamandwe takes over.
Pasuwa is still bitter about the way he was hounded out of the Dynamos job despite delivering four Premiership titles on the bounce.
He says DeMbare chased him away like a drunkard and that is deep coming from a Madzibaba.
Good luck to Nzou, tough luck to Mutasa! Asante Sana. Sir exits the scene! ◆ Sir is a social media commentator and can be contacted on sir18area@ yahoo.com
Rusunguko 10 rock Copa tournament
THE exploits of the “Rusununguko High 10’’ are still being talked about as the 30th edition of the Copa Coca Cola tournament gets ready to explode.
Last year, ten Rusununguko High boys played the Copa Coca Cola tournament and won the Under 15 boys championship after beating Pfupajena 5-4 on penalties at Trojan Mine.
Rusununguko were missing 10 players who were vetted out before the start of the tournament.
Faced with a huge challenge of playing a tournament with no substitutes, the teenage boys from Rusununguko drew inspiration from a number they are used to — 10.
Every morning before lessons started, the boys would jog for 10 kilometres. Later in the evening, they would do sprints for their conditioning.
And their endurance carried the day for them.
It was a proud moment for the school and the U15 soccer team coach Joseph Madzinga who is expected to be in attendance on Tuesday when Rusunguko High School hosts the official launch of this year’s tourney. “It was really special,” recalls Madzinga. “It was a result of our preparation I guess, those 10 km runs in the morning worked and they have become our thing now.
“For this year’s competition we started preparations last term and during the holiday we played friendly matches against Total Academy, Ruwa Academy and Mambas juniors. Our performances were impressive, we stand a good chance to defend our title.”
Diminutive midfielder Michael Saharo is the only remaining player from last year’s championship winning team.
“He is a talented player, it explains why he made the team at a younger age and his experience will be key this year. The current team is naturally motivated to emulate their predecessors, what the boys achieved last year uplifted the whole school,” said Madzinga.
Before every match, the Rusununguko soccer team shout out their team motto, ‘Winners are fighters and fighters are winners’!
They will be hoping to fight all the way to the winner’s podium again, with 11 men this time around. THE sweet taste of winning is spurring Hippo Valley on as the defending champions begin their 2018 campaign this weekend. Apart from winning the Harare Field Hockey title, Hippo Valley also swept every trophy on offer last season and their coach Tongai Mukwewa expects another domineering campaign.
“We are looking forward to another good season,” he said.
“Hopefully we can reproduce that winning form from last season. The aim is to win the league and tournaments so that we qualify to represent Zimbabwe at the Africa Club Championship. Hippo Valley are the holders of the Harare Indoor league title, Knockout Trophy, Indoor Inter-provincial trophy and the HAZ cup. And in their quest to defend their trophies, the team has promoted some youngsters into the senior team.
“We have some exciting Under 21 talent in attacking midfielder Phillip Machaya, Gift Chomunorwa and Ishmael Mufandaedza.
“We have the Project 2018 where we want to have 2000 players from across the country to be involved in hockey by the end of the year. The idea is to spread the game in the Hippo Valley Estate and have more players involved.
“We launched the programme last October with 200 odd players, but now we have about 800 players.
“It has not been easy but we are managing. However, we are grateful to the Hockey Dream Fund from whom we have been getting some second hand equipment.
”But why does a team from Chiredzi play in the Harare League? The league in our Masvingo province is far behind in terms of quality, hence we asked to play in the Harare League and they welcomed us with open arms. “We travel every third week to play three games,” explained Mukwewa.