By Goodwill Zunidza
Soft-spoken former mercurial midfielder Lloyd ‘Samaita’ Mutasa – a football psychological warfare veteran of many years standing – is unperturbed with the comical violence involving a legislator that sequelled MWOS’ home fixture against Scottland at Ngoni Stadium on Sadc Summit day.
Mabvuku House of Assembly representative Pedzisayi Sakupwanya, known as Scott, in a moment of madness, left his seat in the terraces soon after the final whistle, stormed the perimeter fence forcefully entering the pitch and, like a wild bull, lunged at Mutasa aiming a full-fisted blow at the coach which – in the melee – landed on one of his assistants felling him instantly.
The incident would be treated like any other act of hooliganism perpetrated by an unruly fan but what was dishonorable about it is that the MP in question is worryingly the owner of the team Mutasa’s Mwos were playing against.
The fracas followed MWOS’ stunning last-gasp equalizer that shattered Scottland’s wishes of winning the match 1-0 and leapfrogging the Norton side on the increasingly tense Zifa Northern Region First Division table.
Sakupwanya was reportedly incensed by Mutasa’s goal celebration in which he washed his face adjacent the makeshift VIP bay where Sakupwanya was grimacing from.
Sakupwanya, a mere team director who does not hold any specific position in his team’s executive, now faces heavy censure from the league administration for turning a soccer stadium from a beautiful atmosphere of sportsmanship into a degraded environment of feuding illegal gold miners at least for that minute.
He will be sanctioned like any ordinary football hooligan would, which might mean a heavy fine and/or ban from attending football matches.
The Zimbabwe National Soccer Supporters Association has been swift in lambasting the parliamentarian’s misconduct pointing out that football matches should be safe for a family outing.
“We want to thank Norton football lovers for keeping calm and not joining in the hullabaloo. ZINSSA is on a crusade discouraging fans from pitch invasions and we are disturbed that this could happen right in the midst of our campaign,” bemoaned Adomsi Mukwasi, ZINSSA vice-president.
The Ngoni skirmish will be a testing case for Zifa being extraordinary in the sense that the team itself, the whole Scottland entourage, swallowed the bitter pill of that jading result magnanimously and maintained exemplary discipline only to be embarrassed by the behaviour of their patron who will appear in the dock on his own.
Ironically before misplaced rage got the better of him, Sakupwanya had watched the match in the honorable company of Simba Bhora director Simba Ndoro and former Zifa president Phillip Chiyangwa, among other fellow moneybags.
Chiyangwa erred in his new role as a football ambassador by failing to restrain his friend from thuggery at a public event, moreso on the very day our peace-loving Zimbabwe president Emmerson Mnangagwa was being installed as Sadc chairman by regional leaders a few kilometres away in the same province.
Chiyangwa should have advised Sakupwanya that all football grievances, if he had any against Mutasa, are reported to the mother body who are empowered to take relevant action on any offender and that no one takes football laws into their own hand and goes scot-free.
He will be hauled to a Zifa disciplinary hearing while his team only suffers the erasure from memory of midfielder Denver Mukamba’s remarkable long-range effort that had given them a 1-0 first half lead.
Courtesy of the drawn violent encounter the Mabvuku-based side remain in fourth place, two points shy of second-placed Mwos who have 45 points and are, in turn, chasing log leaders Black Rhinos who are on 46 points.
There are still 16 weeks left in the season but the pace is already thickening with Harare City level on points with Mwos and only sitting third because of an inferior goal difference.
Mutasa, who starred for Dynamos for close to a decade experiencing countless pre-match mind games, fiery on-field exchanges, post-match bust-ups and off the pitch tantrums, has already put the Scott howler behind him as he focuses on the task at hand.
“It’s part of the trials and tribulations in football. We are used to it,” is all the Mwos mentor, highly regarded in Division One circles, would say when reached for comment.
The football community now awaits the region to sit on the matter and make a determination that will send a strong message of their ability to steer football in a partial manner that does not the put the game into disrepute.
