Willard Katsande

Midfielder Katsande is both loved and hated in his home nation of Zimbabwe, but the Kaizer Chiefs man has created his own destiny.

Willard Katsande was born into a poor family and had it rough in his teenage years when the death of his father forced him into the life of a vendor, who later relocated to the rural areas to be a herd boy that also sold firewood. He might have ended up as a security guard or supermarket cleaner had he not held on to his football dream that later culminated in him joining Kaizer Chiefs. KICK OFF’s Lovemore Moyo traces his life from rags to riches, but finds that many in his former home despise him for his success.

Ever sat down and recalled just how difficult your upbringing was, especially when you are from a background of poverty but somehow managed to turn into success?

Those are the thoughts that Willard Katsande wakes up to as he reminisces about the days when he didn’t know where his next meal would come from.

The Kaizer Chiefs midfielder didn’t have it easy in his life after being born in Mutoko, Zimbabwe as the second youngest and only boy from a family of seven kids.

When his father, who worked for CocaCola, passed away, Willard had just turned 10 and it marked the start of what would then be a dark phase in his life, which included having to fend for his next meal while staying with his sister after their mom relocated to the rural areas.

He never knew what wearing brand new clothes was and resorted to using the oversize apparel that had been worn by his late father.

Becoming a breadwinner in his teens further built the tenacity that has now become a trademark of his game as he celebrates a decade of playing in the PSL.

“We grew up in abject poverty,” says Chiwoniso, Willard’s older sister. Two other sisters, the oldest in the family, have passed away.

“It became worse after our dad passed away as my mother was forced to stay behind in the rural areas because she didn’t have bus fare to come back and we went for a while without her in town.

“It was just me and Willard. We were both still Primary School kids. It was so tough that we frequently had to eat whatever we could get our hands on. Our survival was dependant on selling vegetables and Willard even had to sell at the soccer grounds,” she recalls.

Chiwoniso was pregnant in her teens and is the mother to Kelvin – the young man that Willard always refers to as his ‘son’ instead of nephew.

She watched the Chiefs midfield enforcer starting out barefoot and knows about how much he was discouraged in chasing his dreams as well.

“His heart was always in football, but we never knew that he would use it to take us away from the life of poverty that we knew. My mom would at times tell him off about football saying, ‘where will this

football of yours take you?’. But he held on.

“He never had proper support for his football career because there was no one at home with the funds to buy him boots. He just wore whatever came his way,” says Chiwoniso, who is grateful to all that her younger brother has done for the family.

“Me and my other sister are working here in Cape Town because of him and we were in an aeroplane for the first time because of him.”

Becoming a man

The Katsande siblings grew up in Mutare, a town on the border with Mozambique.

Though he did all his schooling in the ‘city of Mutare’, he was always in the rural areas every holiday and even spent half a year there in his late teens toughening into the man that he has now become.

He had to go up the mountain for firewood, walk a kilometre for water, herd the cattle, never knew a tea bag and had a soft drink once a year on Christmas.

The suffering that Katsande faced after the death of his father is one of the rare occasions that tears rolled down from his eyes.

He was selling sugarcane and peanuts as he sought to supplement what his mother made as a vendor.

There even came a time when he went to school barefoot wearing a torn uniform which led to other kids making fun of his situation.

His first pair of boots came from the money that his mother raised selling roasted mealies on the roadside after she was convinced by her customers that she had to buy them for her son.

That struggle to make ends meet meant that while other 15-year-olds from his school continued playing junior football, he started playing first team football for

“OUR SURVIVAL WAS DEPENDANT ON SELLING VEGETABLES AND WILLARD EVEN HAD TO SELL AT THE SOCCER GROUNDS.”

lower division club Frontier Steel, where the players were paid.

By the time he completed ‘O’ level education in 2003, his team had won promotion to the First Division.

“Fans used to shout at me for fielding him as a kid because they felt I was exposing him to the dangers of getting injured by the older guys. But then I could see something in him so that is why I felt the need to expose him so that he gains experience as well. Luckily, it paid off for him,” laughs Stephen Mahere, his coach at Frontier Steel.

Mahere took so much interest in Katsande that he went as far as paying his school fees.

“He played football so that he could help put food on the table at home. For him it just didn’t matter that he was training with seniors. The toughness that now defines his game was developed there. In the beginning he cried when he was tackled hard but then as time went on, he would also kick them in return as well and that moulded him to be as hard as he is now,” says Mahere, a former Zimbabwe youth international.

‘His mother wanted him to become a security guard’

It was when Frontier Steel was promoted to the First Division that the winning bonuses improved, enabling him to do morem for the family, including buying cement t to renovate the rural home.

But along the way he was temporarily mporarily forced to relocate to the rural areas as he wasn’t playing as much as he wanted to.

“The difficulties that he faced at home led to him being sent to the rural areas and his mother wanted him to become a security guard, just so that he could have a job. There was also talk that he should work in a supermarket as a cleaner,” recalls his teenage teammate Tom Nyathi.

In the rural areas he chopped wood in the bush for resale to other villagers. All this happened before he turned 20. Spoiling himself with fancy cars and clothes is now a way of making up for the difficulties he faced in his teenage years. Upon his return to the city after five months, he had now developed his physique and such was his progress in the next few years that he moved from playing as a regular at Frontier Steel and Feruka in the First Division, and then broke into the top flight with High way. From there he moved to Gunners in Harare, where he won the league an d played CAF Champions League football prioor to crossing the Limpopo River in 2010. However, through that period he llost two of his sisters. He did not attend eeither tournament that he sponsors in Mutare is sometimes sabotaged by the people there whenever it is advertised,” says Nyathi.

Mahere agrees that Katsande has become a target of ire for many.

“There are guys who were better than him but didn’t go anywhere with their careers. These are guys that the team was built around with the likes of Willard being mere supporting acts.

“Some of these guys expect Willard to look out for them because he has been successful so that is why they hate him. I don’t expect him to be forever indebted to me just because I once paid his school fees and bought him food.

“His efforts and discipline is what carried him through and he just needs to make sure that his future beyond football is secure,” notes Mahere.

“IT IS ALL JEALOUSY FROM SOME WHO THOSE WHO DON’T BELIEVE HOW HE HAS TRANSFORMED HIS LIFE.”

funeral due to fo otball commitments, wwhich led to him bein accused of witcchcraft. In the town where he grew up in Mutare, he is a propheet without hoonour as well.

That l oathing is confir med by Nyathi,, who played with Katsandde for five years at Frontier Steeel and Feruka between 2001-066.

“It is all jealousy from ssome who those who don’t beliieve how he has transformed his liffe. Some accuse him of using muti, but you caannot be consistent for 10 years at Kaizer Chie fs using muti as your weapon. “Unfortunately, with us black Africaans we have such a negative mentality abouut our ownown. He has become an enemy to someso of the guys in Mutare because they want him to be catering for all of them, which he cannot do.

“When he took his COVID-19 donations to Mutoko, some people in Mutare asked why he didn’t come to Mutare where he grew up. Why should he go to where he is only wanted when he must donate? The

From street vendor to Afcon

Nyathi adds that credit is due to the veteran midfielder for the growth in his career.

From being a street vendor to playing before international audiences at the Africa Cup of Nations finals, buying properties and travelling the world.

“Yes, football is played with your feet, but your drive is what takes you places, and Willard has never been short of that. Willard was a kid who could listen to anyone and even up to now he still listens to a guy like me.

“I can even criticise the way he plays at times and he listens in such a way that you see improvement in that aspect in the next game,” says Nyathi, who now works for a courier company in Johannesburg.

From being spotted by the late Edzai Kasinauyo while doing duty for Highway, Katsande was able to first come for trials at SuperSport United during the frenzy of the 2010 World Cup.

However, no deal happened, and he was forced to return home.

Katsande has previously stated that he would have even taken a R5,000 contract as that would have been an improvement from the R1,750 that he earned at Gunners.

While SuperSport were still contemplating

his signing, Ajax Cape Town offered him a trial as they had just lost Clifford Ngobeni and Lance Davids, and needed a holding midfielder replacement.

The Zimbabwean was reluctant to go to the Mother City as he was still digesting the disappointment of what happened in Tshwane.

At that time his mind had been set on making a name for himself locally and getting to play for domestic giants Dynamos, which would have at least enabled him to buy the car that he desired back then, a Mazda 323.

“Willard was a kid that knew what he wanted from a young age and driven by his desire to get out of the poverty that was a part of his young life. So, obviously he desperately needed the opportunities in South Africa that he has made good use of despite not starting too well at Ajax,” says Mahere.

Joining Chiefs and remaining humble

At Ajax, his work permit was only issued four months into the season, which meant he could only make his debut in December 2010.

By then the team was cruising with most of his appearances coming off the bench in a season in which Ajax surrendered their title challenge on the last day of the season.

When Maarten Stekelenburg took over ahead of the next season, Katsande was told he wasn’t in the plans going forward as the club sought to open up a foreigner space with the possibility that he would either be loaned to the First Division or go back to play in Zimbabwe.

A midweek friendly against Zambia in Harare that watched by Bobby Motaung, who was in the country to further assess Lincoln Zvasiya, changed everything.

Motaung was won over by Katsande, whose last appearance for Ajax had been against Chiefs in a game in which he was pulled out after just 36 minutes.

Next, he was telling a surprised Stekelnburg that t he is leaving for Chiefs, where his earnings were w more than tripled, which coupled with a hefty signing on fee meant he could buy a house for his mom in the suburbs of Yeovil in Mutare.

His beloved mom had a big house with satellite television, hot water and the comforts of receiving an allowance of US$500 every month from her son. She died two years ago.

Having now clocked a decade in the PSL, he has long proven just how tenacious a midfield enforcer he is with his mental strength also reflected in his consistency in posting pictures that t always draw the attention of the fashion police.

“At times he surprises with his choices but we have learnt to understand that he is celebrating our parents’ lives through his choice of clothes. He might be such a hard nut to crack on the field, but we enjoy that he is a caring brother off it,” notes Chiwoniso.

There was no celebration when he joined Chiefs, in fact, he was described as a “cheap” option for the club. But he will be leaving as a legend having repaid the club with his heart and soul.

From making his Chiefs debut against Orlando Pirates in the 2011 MTN8 final to then scoring his first for the club against the same Soweto rivals in March 2014, in winning titles and captaining the club, he has reason to feel proud. So far, his game count is approaching 300 one year short of completing a decade at the club.

“The mentality with which he plays his football is the same from the time he played under me. He wasn’t the most talented player but when in the team he stamped his authority,” says Mahere.

“He is a warrior of note and what some don’t know is that he played further up the field when he was still back at home. I am sure at times you have noticed the way he bursts into spaces, such that you can see he is someone who played in offensive spaces before.”

From the poverty he faced as a kid, sleeping on the floor while his parents shared a threequarter bed, he has earned all he has now.

“What hasn’t changed is his love for unsliced bread washed down with a Coke. He also loves his pap warm with vegetables and meat. Willard continues to endorse some of the habits that he picked up when he couldn’t afford things the way he does now,” says his sister.

“HE WASN’T THE MOST TALENTED PLAYER BUT WHEN IN THE TEAM HE STAMPED HIS AUTHORITY. ”