GIVE NTOUBA A BELLS, YES, THIS MIKE TYSON-LIKE GUNSLINGER REALLY DESERVES A SHOT
FOR 39 years, since its birth at Rufaro in 1977, the Harare Derby was a largely a domestic football confrontation whose unique storyline was always dominated by the boys from the hood — from George Shaya at the very beginning to others along the way.
He was 31, back in the first year of the Derby on March 20, 1977, when King George cast his spell on a football match which, with the passage of time, would grow to be like no other when it comes to battles from clubs from the capital city.
Even though he had entered the final phase of his glittering career, the man they called the Mastermind was still good enough — during a three-year golden run in which he won the Soccer Star of the Year three times on the bounce — to overshadow everyone in that very first Derby.
Shaya scored once and created the other two goals for his teammates — Kuda Muchemeyi and David George — in a starring role to inspire Dynamos to a 3-2 victory in a five-goal thriller as the Derby announced its arrival on the domestic football front with a huge bang.
Of course, Shacky Tauro, still short of his 18th birthday, scored twice for CAPS United that day, in a losing cause for his beloved Green Machine, and there are some who argue, with good reason, that the Makepekepe forward should also have won the man-of-the-match award that day.
Given his youth, a novice at this stage of football, playing against the old beast that had long established itself as the dominant force in domestic football, and scoring twice in that match without showing any nerves, maybe, Tauro would have been a fair candidate for the man-of-the-match award.
That he wasn’t, and Shaya’s accolade that afternoon as the game’s outstanding player was universally accepted, puts into context the brilliance of the shift that the Mastermind — who by now had distinguished himself as the best footballer in the country — put into that show.
The high standards that Shaya and Tauro set that afternoon, in the very first Derby, set a benchmark on which the best players from the capital’s two biggest football clubs would always be judged, whenever the iconic showdown between the two teams comes along.
Tauro might not have got his reward that afternoon, getting a man-of-thematch award, but his double strike was enough to announce the arrival of a special breed of striker, probably the best of his generation, who would go on to become a Zimbabwean football legend.
He didn’t have to wait for long, to be crowned the best player of the year in the country, with his coronation coming just two years after that original Derby, in 1979, when — at the age of 20 — he was named the best of the lot in the domestic top-flight league.
A number of players from both Dynamos and CAPS United have, in the past four decades, scaled great heights — Moses Chunga, Joel Shambo, Tauya Murewa, Joe Mugabe — with a lot of them using the Derby to leave a lasting impression in the hearts of their fans.
Chunga was special, his arrival on the stage came at a time when DeMbare were looking for someone to play as well as King George had done, and when some were beginning to lose hope that someone with special football gifts — which distinguish the stars and the superstars — would come along and wear their famous jersey again.
His brilliance was without question, his arrogance just part of the package that somehow boosted his appeal and that, now and again, the Razorman would deliver for his Glamour Boys in very big matches made him a firm favourite with the fans.
Shambo was awesome, a natural talent who was also a very good leader, and that he chose to stick around at CAPS United when others were being lured by Black Rhinos, made him a cult-hero for the Green Machine fans who saw his loyalty as a quality that needed to be appreciated.
And, he was also a big game player, throw him into the Derby and he would always produce his very, very best and that is why, even though Makepekepe never won a league championship throughout the ‘80s when he was their leader, Shambo remains one of the very first names the club’s fans will tell you when they talk of their all-time heroes.
The Derby, for 39 years, was largely a battle made in Mbare, which largely featured the best players from the capital and, for all its flirtation with a number of players from the region, the weight of the pressure that comes with the big game appeared to destroy the expatriates ability to tame this big game and leave a lasting impression on it.
Of course, one Malawian changed that, with a starring role for CAPS United in the Derby, but Joseph Kamwendo was just a rare breed and that you can’t count five foreign players, who tamed this beast of a contest and became its storyline, in the past 40 years, tells its own story.
A FLIRTATION WITH WEST AFRICA
Twenty years ago, the Derby extended its beat to West Africa when a Ghanaian forward George Owusu was wooed into its ranks and, for good measure, he was part of the Glamour Boys bandwagon that rolled into the CAF Champions League final in 1998.
But, for all of Owusu’s occasional brilliance, the isolated patches of beauty lacked the consistency needed to build cult-hero status and leave the kind of impression that would make him a big part of the tale every time the Derby was talked about.
And the Derby remained what it has always been for 39 years — a local intercity football confrontation of the best the capital can provide, a touch of occasional regional brilliance brought by Kamwendo with the Malawian providing some light to the darkness cast by the regional foreigners who came and failed in the big game.
Others can argue that both Ian Bakala and Laughter Chilembe also left their special imprints on the Derby.
But whether they did as well as what we saw from one very good expatriate, in his first Derby experience, is something I am prepared to argue against.
On Sunday — on the 40th anniversary of the year the big match started — a Cameroonian gunslinger with a big match temperament and the character to deliver when it always matters, came along and took over the show with a double strike that decided the contest.
Christian Joel Epoupa Ntouba always wanted to play for Dynamos, a dream he has nursed since he was a 15-year-old boy, after first hearing about, and falling for, these Glamour Boys when they took on Cameroonian club Coton Sport Garoua in the semi-finals of the CAF Champions League.
He was so desperate for that, when a window of opportunity opened for him, he even paid his airfare to come to Harare to try and convince the Glamour Boys coaching staff that he had the quality to make the grade at the club and spearhead their attack.
Doubts lingered among the DeMbare leaders, for a good reason too, because they had been burnt before — promised heaven and earth by foreigners like Mbimba who later turned out to be hopeless misfits — while a crew sent to scout for talent in Zambia came back singing glowing praises about a striker who hit the bar and post seven times in half an hour — but proved horribly out of depth when he came here.
But when, after just a week at training, Lloyd Mutasa gave his endorsement, we should have known this guy was something different because, he might have his weaknesses when it comes to tactics, Samaita’s eye for talent is beyond doubt and he knows a good player when he sees one.
And on Sunday, in the Derby, Ntouba delivered in a very big way as his two goals made all the difference to this tight match, sucking life out of a battling Green Machine and giving The Glamour Boys a priceless victory that could define their quest for a league title this year.
They were not spectacular strikes like his wonder goal against Ngezi Platinum in that five-goal thriller — the first a routine stroking of the ball to the right side of Edmore Sibanda’s goal after the rebound had fallen into his path and the second a free header from close range after Ocean Mushure delivered a peach of a cross from a free-kick that should never have been given.
But, in a game where it’s goals that make all the difference, his positioning — to be always at the right place at the right time to deliver the knockout blows that flattened the Green Machine on Sunday — is in itself a quality in gunmanship that we tend to take for granted and which great strikers have in abundance, always anticipating, always gambling, always believing the ball will come where they are.
Lesser souls, burdened by the weight of both expectation and the excitement of being asked to lead the line for such a massive football franchise in such a huge game and before such a big crowd, would have blown their chances -either going for power and not placement for the first goal and sending the ball flying over the bar or heading straight at ZiKeeper, rather than away from him, when Mushure’s beauty made contact with his head.
What stood out for me was his ocean of confidence, his belief in his athletic powers that he would score on both occasions, there was never an element of doubt he would miss any of the two big chances that came his way on Sunday.
That Ntouba chose the big stage of the Harare Derby on Sunday to show that he is the real deal, and dominate the headlines, refusing to be destroyed by the weight of the occasion and leading from the front, always asking for the ball, always going into dangerous positions, was simply awesome.
IT’S HIS TEMPERAMENT THAT SHINES BRIGHTLY
This week, former Manchester United defender Phil Neville, who has become a pundit in England, heaped a lot of praise on teenage English striker Marcus Rashford after he scored a winning goal for England in a World Cup game against Slovakia.
“His biggest quality is his temperament,” Neville told BBC 5Live. “He never looks flustered, he can miss a chance and never looks flustered.
“He’s improving every time I see him. He’s getting stronger, he’s getting fitter and I just think we’ve got an absolute gem on our hands.
“He’s got brilliant technique and the best thing about him is he’s got his feet on the ground.
“He goes and watches his mates play on a Sunday, goes out on the streets playing football with his mates.
“He doesn’t really post things on Instagram or Twitter that you think ‘he’s getting carried away things’
“I just think if you’re managing Marcus Rashford at the moment, you’ve got a little superstar.’’
Reading every word of Neville’s assessment of Rashford had me thinking of Ntouba and why this Cameroonian forward has been so different and yet so deadly.
After his heroics in his first Derby, we didn’t see Ntouba trying to dominate the media space with interviews to tell the country that the real star had arrived on its land.
We didn’t see him dominating the social media platforms with pictures of his goals or the match reports which were hailing him as the new superstar of domestic football.
We didn’t see him bunking training on Tuesday, simply because he knew Lloyd Mutasa would field him again tomorrow in the Battle of Zimbabwe because he is the main striker, but instead, from what we hear, he was the first at the training ground that day and the last to leave.
That’s the kind of professionalism that separates the men and the boys, the stars and the superstars, the ordinary athletes and those who become legends — the ability for someone to keep his feet on the ground even in the week when everyone is saying he is the star of the show.
The refusal to be drowned in the media hysteria and the endless quest to try and always improve himself, knowing that he can do better the next time he is on the field, and where he scored two in the Derby, he now wants to score three in his next game.
“Dynamos is the best player because it’s one team,’’ he told our sister newspaper, H-Metro this week when they asked him if he thought he was now the best player at the Glamour Boys.
“Football in Zimbabwe is a bit hard, the fighting spirit makes every team hard to play against.’’
Now, here is a man who has tamed the Derby, in his first dance with the big match, refusing to be singled out as the hero and, instead, lauding all his teammates for the part they played in that victory.
Here is a man, whose face has been in every newspaper this week, refusing to be hailed as the hero and, instead, saying that what matters isn’t him but the club that he plays for and the fans that he represents.
Here is a man, in his finest week, refusing to mock the opposition — including his team’s biggest city rivals as having a weak defence, as some would have rushed to do, but instead giving respect to the defeated opponents.
That is a true professional and Dynamos have a real gem on their hands in this Cameroonian and, on the 40th anniversary of the Harare Derby, the old battle finally was tamed by an expatriate footballer. To God Be The Glory Come on Warriors!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Khamaldinhoooooooooooooooooo! Text Feedback — 0772545199 WhatsApp Messenger — 0772545199 Email — robsharuko@gmail.com Skype — sharuko58 Chat with me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter @Chakariboy, interact with me on Viber or read my material in The Southern Times or on www.sportszone. co.zw. The authoritative ZBC weekly television football magazine programme, Game Plan, is back on air and you can interact with me and the legendary Charles “CNN” Mabika and producer Tich “Chief” Mushangwe every Monday night NOW AT 21.15pm.