With only a seven percent winning run, over a 14 game unsatisfactory spell, the football fraternity pressed Zimbabwe Football Association (ZIFA) to take action and avert the disaster.
Loud cries from stakeholders and the public, clamoring for blood and the need to axe the Croatian gaffer, Zdravko Logarusic, following a dismal display of football in the first two matches of the World Cup Qualifiers.
Had they forgotten about the last Cosafa campaign?
From the technical side, the team has long forgotten the net since the coach took over the reins in February last year.
ZIFA board chairperson, Sugar Chagonda slammed Loga’s “lack of leadership skills”. He expressed the imminent disaster that will befall ZIFA if they maintain the status quo.
However, football in Zimbabwe has long been dead. Better coaches we have seen in the decade, including Norman Mapeza and Callisto Pasuwa who are at this moment doing well at club levels.
Yes, the coach might not have been the best, but the rot was always there in the fraternity. It is spreading as fast as it can.
ZIFA bowed to pressure and called for an executive meeting meant to review the team’s performance and decided the fate of the unpopular coach.
From the outlook of things, axing Loga will save the face of the current Warriors squad as they face another mammoth task of qualifying for the World Cup.
As for saving Zimbabwean football, another wholesome approach is direly needed. Tables must be shaken in the structures and root out the problem.
In an extraordinary case last week ZBC news online created a Twitter poll on the issue. More than 8 000 users participated. 68% of the people voted that Loga and ZIFA must hang their boots for the revival of the long-forgotten SADC football firebrand.
Word going around was that the Croat had some sympathizers within the board, who were keen on protecting him. That is why it has been difficult to make the final decision. This debacle itself presents a fiasco that will forever remain in the country’s football if an overhaul of the association itself is delayed.
Loga aside, the SRC, ZIFA, and PSL have long failed to keep the football furnace in the country alive as grassroots football has long been abandoned.
The local league is not well fed with new scouted talents and that itself is a contributing factor to the loss of the beautiful game in Zimbabwe.
Funding stakeholders have lost confidence in the game, the trail is there. From corruption reports to kit troubles to lack of player welfare and unpaid good coaches in the past. COVID-19 itself has not spared the pigskin in Zimbabwe as ZIFA also failed to come up with strategic ways of giving the selected team ample time to prepare for action.
Probably it is for the best if we choose our gaffers from the local pool. The game needs people who will maintain consistency and the Zimbabwean style of play. The warriors have been reduced to minions, after a shameful loss to Ethiopia.
In the end, axing Loga will temporarily divert the anger of football fans but in the long run, a structural revamp will prove useful in the saving of Zimbabwean football.
