Mick Poole foretold football squabbles 50 years ago
BOARDROOM squabbles that have left Zimbabwean football on the deathbed under the leadership of Felton Kamambo are not a new phenomenon.
Back in 1973, former Callies goalkeeper Mick Poole, who later became the Zimbabwe senior national team coach in the early days of independence, touched on the issues which the successive football leadership in this country have basically inherited ever since.
From one generation to the other, football administration in Zimbabwe has never been smooth sailing and in some cases, the Sports and Recreation
Commission has had to intervene with a heavy hand to restore sanity.
It is baffling how the football leaders never learn from the mess created by those before them.
The late Poole made three recommendations when asked what the domestic game needed to do to scale heights during an interview with Prize Magazine way back in 1973. Although he was a mere player then, he had to come out of his shell and address the thorny issues of the day.
Poole had just won the Player of the Month award while turning out for Callies and his sentiments were summarised as follows: “He feels that Rhodesian soccer can go a long way if a few problems can be sorted out, and he makes the following suggestions which he thinks will help the game:
- An end to all the petty squabbling between the top administrators
- More dedication by the pl ayers to training and applying themselves to the game. - Less publicity given to managers and coaches, and more given to the teams as a whole.”
Poole, who was described as a passionate professional whose impact touched many great players at his death last year, was one of the best football brains available during the early days of Independence.
He coached the national Under-20 side before taking charge of the senior side. He was largely credited as the man behind the national team moniker, the Warriors.
Poole was the head coach of the Zimbabwe senior national team when they lifted the CECAFA Cup title in Harare in October 1985.
He also coached Dynamos and Arcadia United before relocating to England where he died last year at the age of 85 years. He had a long playing career, having signed at English side Nottingham Forest at the age of 15 years.
Then he went on to join the British Army before returning to Africa for stints with Castle Lions and B.S.A.P as player and then coach, before deciding again to come back and play full-time. So he resigned his job as Sables coach and signed for Callies in 1972 as a goalkeeper.
His interview the following year after excelling with Callies still holds significance, despite almost 50 years having passed by.
The petty squabbling between the top administrators, as mentioned by Poole, has been an albatross around the neck of the domestic game for a long time.
It should not be surprising that the game finds itself in another crisis. The ZIFA leadership, under the leadership of Felton Kamambo, has been in the spotlight in the last few months.
True to Poole’s remarks, the leadership almost always find themselves dominating the back pages, mostly for the wrong reasons at the expense of the dedicated players.
In a normal situation, it is the players that should be filling these spaces. But here they are often overshadowed by these merchants of confusion.
ZIFA politics have dominated the football narrative of late. The suspended Kamambo board, which is headed for implosion after some councillors called for the extraordinary general meeting to revoke their mandate, has taken the off-field drama to whole new levels.
This board has been involved in petty politics from the onset, which saw one of the members, Chamu Chiwanza, and vice-chairman, Gift Banda, being shunted out as early as the first month after they were ushered into office.
For almost the whole length of their term, they have been fighting, ignoring the fundamentals of their mandate. As a result, the ZIFA board came terribly short of the expectations and the Sports Commission late last year stepped in and suspended the leadership.
But the suspensions have been resisted by some members of the board who include Kamambo, Phillemon Machana and Bryton Malandule.
Instead, they have turned their guns on the sports regulator, releasing some inflammatory statements, while hiding behind the FIFA principle of non-interference into football management by third parties.
The association found itself in the throes of another violent assault this week when the suspended board wielded the axe on its members and other officials who included ZIFA councillors who have requested a special extraordinary general meeting, PSL officials and ZIFA staffers, Xolisani Gwesela and Wellington Mpandare.