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Ricky Zililo, Senior Sports Reporter
TENSIONS in the Highlanders’ camp have eased after the players agreed to accept US$70 salary top-ups and give the club time to find a solution to their demands of an upward review.

Bosso players went on strike, boycotting training sessions for three days and threatened not to turn up for last Sunday’s Chibuku Super Cup match against Bulawayo City, accusing the club’s executive committee of reneging on its promise of increasing their salaries.

The players were demanding US$100 each as salary top ups and they even rejected a well-wisher’s offer of half of their demands.

They eventually trained at a private school on Saturday and went on to beat City 1-0 to remain on course to defending the title they won in 2019.

On Tuesday, they again embarked on industrial action, accusing the club’s leadership of lacking urgency in addressing their demands.

Footballers Union of Zimbabwe president Desmond Maringwa intervened and mediated a meeting between the players and club’s executive where a compromise was reached that players return to training after Bosso topped up US$20 to the US$50 allowances the anonymous Victoria Falls donor had offered.

Sources said the club undertook to brief the players on salary increments next week.

“We’ve since agreed to go back to work after getting US$70 each. Another meeting is scheduled for next week when the executive said they will be done with their budget. We hope everything will work out fine and we will not have to worry about our welfare and instead concentrate on playing football,” said one player.

“Next week’s meeting is all about briefing us on what they would have done to address our grievances. But what we want is that come month end, the club will honour its promise of an upward review of salaries,” said another player.

This leaves the Highlanders’ leadership with two weeks to look for resources to fund the players’ salary demands.

Highlanders are inactive in the Chibuku Super Cup this weekend, as their group has reached the halfway stage and are waiting for Group A based in Harare, which has six teams, to get to the halfway mark before they start reverse fixtures.

Ronald Moyo, the Highlanders’ spokesperson, said he had not yet been given an official briefing about the outcome of the club executive’s meeting with Fuz, while Maringwa declined to divulge any details. — @ZililoR