The Sunday News
Cosmas Zulu
If the world was a stage, then the stadium is the stage par excellence. Yet fewer and fewer people are prepared to go into this theatre of dreams.
Dwindling gate figures is the latest problem facing football clubs and reasons for the fall in attendance are common knowledge. Hooliganism and poor standard of play, among others are to blame. The games are not always up to expectations in terms of quality but the facilities should also be improved so that they create an atmosphere that will attract more fans. The sitting arrangement needs attention and the whole outlook of the stadia should be changed so that it is ideal for a family outing. There should be some kind of leisure park around the stadium, playing fields, shopping centre, swimming pools, restaurants etc. This must be the way forward.
It’s a disgrace that spectators are kept waiting before and after a match with no provision made for their entertainment. That providing entertainment would cost too much is just an excuse of idleness. I am convinced that commercial advertising departments would be delighted to sponsor entertainment of various kinds before kick-off and even during half-time. You can have artistes performing at stadia and that should be a good start, and we are not implementing such ideas because authorities have a negative attitude.
We should also begin to introduce a bit of electronic equipment into the stadiums, for instance a game video screen next to the score board so that spectators can watch re-plays of the most exciting parts of the match in close up or slow motion. Now back to the field of play.
Black Rhinos versus Yadah (NSS)
Some of these teams have no followers but they can make some income from for example, getting a company to install branded rubbish bins in the stands and then get advertisers to pay the clubs.
The National Sports Stadium surface showed me how well maintained the field of play is. The lawn was well cut and passing should have been made easier for players with balls getting to the intended destination, but that was not the case because of the teams themselves. Rhinos failed to win and conceded the first goal from a throw-in. Their defenders failed to pick an opponent who created the goal scored by Simba Sithole in the 12th minute. But defenders were also found wanting and two minutes into the second-half when a Rhinos players jumped to jack-knife a header in the net for the equaliser with the goalkeeper glued to the ground.
Yadah, though having missed a number of chances, eventually got the decisive goal in the 57th minute with the Rhinos goal minder minding his own business, which had nothing to do with football, but bird watching. Both goalkeepers’ coaches must tell their goal minders that anything in the six-yard box is the goalkeeper’s business. It’s a no go area and no free headers.
Dynamos versus Ngezi Platinum (Rufaro Stadium)
I have been watching Dynamos as a player and later as a coach, and now as a football columnist I have never felt so sad for the team as last Sunday. This is not because they lost the game. Though the goal came from a corner which was flicked in the 40th minute to give Ngezi Platinum the lead which became the winning goal, it could have been avoided. But the match was just poor from both sides.
Dynamos had two shots on target for the entire game. Ngezi also blew hot and cold and the highlight was perhaps when they had a shot deflecting on a defender with a goal written all over it, only to be saved brilliantly with one hand by the Dynamos ’keeper. It was sad seeing Dynamos supporters standing outside the stadium staring haplessly, shaking their heads after the match.
Dynamos are now on number 12 on the log competing for attention with the likes of Harare City, ZPC Kariba, Yadah and Herentals — teams whom a Dynamos supporter of yesteryear never dreamt could be on top of DeMbare on the log. “Team ye ‘nyika yose’ ye seven million”. I am saying this as a football guru who has been in football for 52 years uninterrupted that Dynamos need an indaba, not to shout or fight the present administration, but to look back and say “what is it we used to do to make this institution look good and where did we go wrong to be where we are now?”
