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Cosmas Zulu

Senior Sports Reporter
ZIFA are today expected to formally announce a new high performance technical committee whose duties will be to recommend strategies to be used and identify players for the various representative national sides. While it was not immediately clear whether any of the members of the previous committee which was led by Benedict Moyo would be retained, Zifa communications manager Xolisani Gwesela said his association was in the process of notifying the identified individuals first before making the names public.

“They have been identified, yes but we will only be in a position to announce (their names) to the public tomorrow (today),” said Gwesela.
Other members of the previous committee were veteran coaches Gibson Homela, Cosmas Zulu and head of the Zimbabwe Soccer Coaches Association Bhekimpilo Nyoni while Maxwell Takaendesa Jongwe replaced fired Nelson Matongorere who was the Zifa technical director.

Their role was to help national team coaches by monitoring performances of players and recommending them and also to review the teams’ performances.

The national team coach, however, has the final decision on the issues which would have been deliberated upon and recommended.
Moyo said his committee was largely ignored and they last met in October 2012 where they resolved to part ways with then Warriors coach Rahman Gumbo.

Two years after the technical committee was set up, the committee, whose tenure expires at the end of July, had little input into the senior national soccer team’s 2015 Afcon campaign.

The committee was set up at the height of the failed 2013 Africa Cup of Nations campaign qualifiers whose finals were held in South Africa last year.

The Warriors crashed out of the qualifiers after losing 2-3 to minnows Tanzania in the preliminary stages of next year’s competition.
Gorowa’s charges lost 0-1 in Tanzania before drawing two all with the Taifa Stars in Harare on Sunday quashing the nation’s hopes of an appearance at the Afcon finals to be held in Morocco.

Moyo confirmed that the technical committee had not been consulted prior to the latest Warriors fiasco adding that things could have turned out differently had they been consulted.

Football powerhouses such as Nigeria and Zambia have such structures which are used to monitor performances of players plying their trade locally and overseas and giving recommendations to the head coach.

South Africa reintroduced theirs which they had abandoned during the run up to the 2013 Afcon finals which the country hosted.