REVENGE FOR SD AS ZIMBABWE LOSE

MBABANE – Swazi referees led by Simanga Nhleko got what would appear as Swaziland’s revenge over Zimbabwe, by allowing what television replays suggested was an offside goal as neighbours South Africa beat Zimbabwe to stand.

South Africa Under-23s secured a 3-0 win over Zimbabwe Under-23s at Harry Gwala Stadium on Saturday to secure a 4-1 aggregate victory and qualify for the CAF U-23 Championships. Owen Da Gama’s side will now compete in the 8-Nations tournament in Senegal in November, where the top three teams will qualify for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

Zimbabwe referee Ruzive Ruzive hogged the limelight for the wrong reasons and was sent packing for controversial officiating at the COSAFA Cup tournament in May hosted by South Africa in Rustenburg.

Ruzive, who has had his bad days in some of the domestic Zimbabwe Premiership games he handled, had been ranked highly when he arrived in the South African North West Province with the Zimbabwean rated among the top four referees for the tournament.

He had also lived up to his billing with a fine showing in his opening assignment, a Group B game between Lesotho and Madagascar.

But he was expelled for controversially handling the Group B decider between Madagascar and Sihlangu with his two glaring mistakes ensuring that it was the Indian Ocean islanders who progressed to the quarter-­final at the expense of a bitter Sihlangu.
The two teams drew the game 1-all and finished with the same number of points - seven but Madagascar advanced on the basis that they had scored one goal more.

Madagascar were left celebrating a first ever place in the last eight but the COSAFA referees committee chaired by Namibian John Muinjo exercised zero tolerance on poor officiating and also expelled Lesotho referee Osiase Koto.
Meanwhile Nhleko’s assistants on the day were Petros Mbingo and Sifiso Nxumalo.

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