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With just one match left to play and the Castle Lager Premier Soccer League 2016 season drawing to an exciting end this weekend, there is everything still to play and fight for at the top and bottom ends of the log table that it is only natural and perfectly normal that pulses have been set racing among the clubs and the fans as we get to a nail-biting cliffhanger.
It has been a rollercoaster ride for most of the clubs since they first set the ball rolling to kick-start the current camping in March that its concluding round of matches this weekend has become something of a fixation among anxious followers of the game across the country.
Crowning moment
Title-chasing FC Platinum are pushing table-toppers CAPS United to the wire and it will be interesting to see who, among the two, will do just enough to drag themselves over the finishing line. The Zvishavane miners did themselves something of a huge favour by ending Highlanders’ interest in the championship after overpowering Bosso 3-0 on Sunday. MaKepeKepe, meanwhile, kept the destiny of the title firmly in their own hands when they dismissed a battling and stubborn Ngezi Platinum Stars 1-0 to maintain their two-point cushion at the summit.
Between the green-shirted duo, a new champion will be crowned, replacing dethroned Chicken Inn as the new kings of Zimbabwean football. Both are chasing outright wins, while hoping that the other falls short by dropping points.
That the pair will be facing relegation threatened sides has also added an intriguing side-plot to the already gripping finale. To curry another absorbing flavour to it all, both the Green Machine and Pure Platinum Play will be playing away from home! With the drama currently surrounding the relegation-promotion saga (are two, four or none teams to be demoted?), Chapungu are not entirely safe that Lloyd Chitembwe and his charges need to tread carefully on a potential banana skin situation at Ascot.
Tsholotsho, on the other hand, are languishing precariously in the drop zone and pose some serious danger of denting Norman Mapeza’s title hopes.
Effectively, this then neatly tucks the Chapungu-CAPS United and Tsoholotsho-FC Platinum matches away from being thrown away or fixed and Fair Play can easily prevail because it will be a defining moment for all the four teams involved as their season is hugely hinged on the outcome of these two ties.
Also, will CAPS United get a taste of their own bitter medicine? After having in the past erected insurmountable hurdles in the way of ZPC Kariba and Harare City, who were on the verge of clinching the title on the final day of the season, will MaKepeKepe have the wind taken out of their sail and have their ship rendered wreckage by Waru-Waru and deny them a podium finish?
Relegation puzzle and Fair Play
For now, let us momentarily ignore the storm brewing around the relegation-promotion question as it is yet to be resolved, but firmly fix our attention on who stays up in this bruising battle for survival.
As it stands, one of Mutare City Rovers or Tsholotsho will certainly go down (well, assuming that only two teams face the chop as pronounced at the beginning of the season; an understanding that most teams built their campaign around!).
If we, however, go by the new twist to the saga that four teams will be demoted, then Chapungu, Triangle, Hwange and How Mine all find themselves sucked into the vortex of this defend-and-attack puzzle for dear life as they seek to preserve their Premiership status.
While some among these teams will face those with nothing to lose, really – like Bulawayo City (vs How Mine), Highlanders (vs Hwange), Harare City (vs Triangle) and Ngezi Platinum (vs Mutare City Rovers) — many neutrals would, of course, logically invoke the spirit of Fair Play.
As such, Friday Football Echoes implores evenhandedness among the teams involved so we safeguard the sanctity of fairness. Let the best team on the day win or the worst lose, without any undue influence.
Salvaging a wooden spoon from the season
Over the last two seasons, Dynamos and Chicken Inn were the football champions in this great land between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers.
Interestingly, the Gamecocks inherited the crown from DeMbare and in this season-ender they lock horns fighting for only a wooden spoon. Because you see, Dear Reader, in this part of the world — save for the prize money — nothing, really, of significance comes with finishing fourth in the championship race. That’s exactly what the battle between Dynamos and Chicken to finish fourth is precisely like — nothing more than a struggle to save face and stroke some bruised egos, as the two Harare and Bulawayo sides square off with only two points separating them.
Kick violence out
Given what is at stake in this final round of matches of the season, emotions are bound to run high and boil over. A defeat is sometimes difficult to take, but as long as we remain blessed with the gift of life then we can always live to fight another day. As such, football lives shall not necessarily end with failing to win the coveted championship or getting relegated. Should this happen, fans must not think with their hearts — for football is a highly emotive game — but with their heads and desist from violence.
These are just matches in which we win, lose and draw some that should the latter happen, as sincere followers and true friends of the game we must be prudent enough to take it all in our stride and never allow it to cloud our senses of perspicacious sportsmanship.
The violent scenes that erupted at Mandava last Sunday during an FC Platinum-Highlanders contest were as deplorable as they were retrogressive that we condemn them as having no place in a beautiful game that gets watched and followed by families. In fact, there is more to the game that should unite us than seeing us turn against each other every time a result doesn’t go our team’s way.
Let’s enjoy this gripping finale to a season that has been truly enthralling while it lasts.
It’s Game On, Play On!
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