The Sunday News
Mehluli Sibanda, Senior Sports Reporter
FROM the time they got into the Premier Soccer League, FC Platinum have always aimed higher.
In their very first season in the PSL in 2011, FC Platinum gunned for the championship, with the race against Dynamos going all the way to the last day of the season. Dynamos won the title on goal difference that season, a massive achievement for FC Platinum seeing that it was just their first season at the top.
Had they won the championship “Kugona Kunenge Kudada” as FC Platinum were known back in the day would have achieved something that is rare locally for a team to win the league title in their very first season.
FC Platinum refused to let the disappointment of their maiden season deter them from gunning for the most sought-after prize in domestic football.
In 2016, they were back in the hunt once again, this time Caps United their challengers. Going into the decisive fixtures, FC Platinum were counting on a slip up from Makepepeke against Chapungu at Ascot while they faced Tsholotsho at Luveve. Wins for both teams saw Caps United taking it.
That was the end of the pain for FC Platinum who were crowned Zimbabwean champions at Ascot Stadium in 2017 with a 2-0 triumph over Chapungu. Dynamos were fighting them for the title that year but there was nothing to deny the Zvishavane-based team that time around. Early goals by Rodwell Chinyengetere and Ali Sadiki ensured that the team from Zvishavane became only the second one from outside Bulawayo and Harare to be crowned Zimbabwean champions after St Paul’s Musami last did it in 1966.
From being near men over the years, FC Platinum are now the team to beat seeing that they have gone on to win the championship three times in a row. Pure Platinum Play, as they are now called, have achieved something that only the likes of Highlanders and Dynamos have done over the years, that is to keep the PSL championship trophy permanently in their cabinet after winning it for three years uninterrupted.
There is no doubt that FC Platinum will continue to dominate on the local front and it is hard to imagine any team managing to dislodge them in the near future.
