Umbro yet to supply
MORE than a month after sealing a kit sponsorship deal with British sportswear company, Umbro, Zifa are yet to get any supplies-playing kit and replicas — with less than two weeks before the Warriors’ crunch Total African Nations Cup qualifier against Republic of Congo.
Umbro became the official kit sponsor for all representative Zimbabwe national teams and the signing ceremony was officially done early last month.
“We haven’t received anything yet but maybe get in touch with us sometime next week,” said the association’s communications manager Xolisani Gwesela yesterday.
Zifa president Felton Kamambo recently told the media that they were expecting to sell one million replica jerseys in batches of 250 000 per quarter which will see the cash scrapped associating raking in about $3 million.
“Umbro will do the marketing part, what we have said to them is that we have got a brand which is our Warriors and other representative national sides. We also have got the numbers in terms of fan base locally and abroad so they must come up with a strategy. The marketing part of it is still being worked out but it’s not our part, it’s Umbro’s baby but we must be able to get what belongs to us at the end of each quarter,” said Kamambo.
Kamambo also lifted the lid on the poor state of the various representative national teams after he revealed that the sides only had one set of uniforms.
In a normal set up, national teams are supposed to be well kitted and have a kit for each match which will allow the players to even exchange their kits with opponents after a match or even give it to fans in appreciation for their support.
Speaking during Classic 263’s The Grill programme recently, Kamambo said Umbro will provide the national teams with a kit for each of their matches.
“Umbro will provide a kit for each game so that our players can be able to even throw away to the fans the kit they would have been wearing for that game. Previously they could not do that because if they did, that would have meant that in the next game we were not going to be having a complete set of uniforms,” said Kamambo.