WANDERERS DEAD AS A DODO!

My dearest readers ...

Now that you have read the story on the back page ... oh, you haven’t because you always want to start reading your favourite column first! Fine by me. But with my permission, please turn to the back page. Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you. Mbabane Swallows President Bishop Bheki Lukhele has taken Manzini Wanderers to court for a E200 000 debt. It gets worse for the maroon and white outfit on and off-the-field. However, since this  matter is sub judice, let me have my two cents worth opinion on matters on the field, where Manzini Wanderers is proving with each passing week to be a modern day football tragedy.

The ‘Weslians’, the country’s most fervently supported side and my family club, has not won a single game in ten games. The last time Wanderers won a game, probably half of the adult population of this country was recovering from a terrible hangover, after the New Year’s Eve festivities. Some were still half-drunk when Njabulo ‘Koko’ Gama and Fabrice Mopina scored the two goals that won the last game against Denver Sundowns on January 1, 2022 at Mavuso Sports Centre. It rained in the Kalahari Desert. Ten games later, the ‘Weslians’ are still searching for their second win and in the process, they lost veteran coach Nyanga ‘Crooks’ Hlophe, who has been replaced by Velekhaya Mtsetfwa. Mtsetfwa, a former National Under-17 head coach, is winless in four games.

The hub giants, who are softer-than-a-marshmallow, are lying on the tenth spot with a measly 21 points in 19 games. Five wins; six draws; eight losses; 23 goals scored and 27 conceded, resulting in a negative four goals is the story of their dreadful season. Wanderers are a club in chaos. Log leaders, Mbabane Highlanders are 22 points ahead of Wanderers, having played the same number of games. Why is Wanderers so bananas? Why is such a fervently supported side dead as a dodo? Wanderers have not won a trophy since the Eswatini Telecom Charity Cup back on August 5, 2005. The price of bread was still a modest E4.

Years of maladministration, battle over the rightful ownership of the club and average players has contributed to the longest run without a trophy for this great institution founded in 1957.
An urgent meeting has been called today, where the supporters will meet to ‘discuss how we can help the team out of the situation it is currently in as this has never happened in the history of the team,’ that is according to Vusi ‘Majaivane’ Dlamini, the former Brand Manager, if ever such a position ever meant anything in the vanguard of our football. One wonders what such a meeting would produce to help rescue the sinking ship.

record

This column, the State-of-the-Nation-Sports-Address (SONSA) has said it numerous times, at the risk of sounding like a stuck record, that as long as the ownership of the club remains the big elephant in the room, the celestial decline of the Wanderers brand will continue unabated. Director Sandile ‘Chief’ Dlamini is a good fellow, he means well and loves the club to bits but he is a polarising figure at the club. They love to hate him and blame Wanderers current situation to his leadership. This has been ongoing for years. The results at the club have not helped his case. Wanderers, since the sad demise of Henry ‘Shushu’ Mthethwa has seen directors come and go. Look at Cedric Mathata, the Mpumalanga-based South African businessman, who is reportedly the one bank-rolling the club. He is hardly here to even watch the club and a majority of the club fans don’t know him from the man in the moon.

There is no connection between the director, fans and players. This wouldn’t work in a football team. Even oligarchs like Roman Abramovich used to fly to Chelsea’s home games at Stamford Bridge in London. It is small things like that which could make a difference. It is things like the director watching his side, which can motivate players who would feel appreciated. Arsenal’s longest serving manager, Arsene Wenger could not have put it with more alluring clarity when he said: “A football team is like a beautiful woman. If you don’t remind her she is beautiful, she forgets.”

investor

This brings into sharp focus the foreign ownership of our big teams, in particular when the investor is not hands on or hardly visible. Wanderers’ challenges on the field are as a result of a combination of many factors and cannot be blamed on one person. We can all appreciate now that coach Nyanga ‘Crooks’ Hlophe was not the source of all the troubles at Wanderers. Maybe he was not the only one who has run out of ideas at the club too. I repeat, without fear of contradiction, Wanderers should confront the elephant in the room before it is too late. Four points above the relegation zone, with 11 games remaining in a season where four teams will go down is a big threat indeed. If this slippery slope is not arrested, it could end in tears. My dearly departed father, the biggest Wanderers person I know, must be spinning in his grave in the red soil of the rolling hills of Khalangilile! 

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