Coulda, shoulda, woulda - Our soccer sucks, always leaving a rueful taste

 

 

BRITISH journalist and novelist John Lanchester, in an article Ballet With the Ball: A Love Story, romanticised soccer thus:
"At some deep level the reason soccer snags us is that good soccer is beautiful, and it's difficult, and the two are related.

A team kicking the ball to each other, passing into empty space that is suddenly filled by a player who wasn't there two seconds ago and who is running at full pelt and who without looking or breaking stride knocks the ball back to a third player who he surely can't have seen, who, also at full pelt and without breaking stride, then passes the ball, at say 60 miles an hour, to land on the head of a fourth player who has run 75 yards to get there and who, again all in stride, jumps and heads the ball with, once you realise how hard this is, unbelievable power and accuracy toward a corner of the goal just exactly where the goalkeeper, executing some complex physics entirely without conscious thought and through muscle-memory, has expected it to be, so that all this grace and speed and muscle and athleticism and attention to detail and power and precision will never appear on a score sheet and will be forgotten by everybody a day later - this is the strange fragility, the evanescence of soccer.

It's hard to describe and it is even harder to do, but it does have a deep beauty, a beauty hard to talk about and that everyone watching a game discovers for themselves, a secret thing, and this is the reason why soccer, which has so much ugliness around it and attached to it, still sinks so deeply into us: Because it is, it can be, so beautiful."

I’m no soccer fanatic in the truest sense of the word, and I only played the game on dusty pitches as a little boy. Though my grandmother who watched me then could swear I could have made the starting line-up for the national team had I continued. Of course my wife is hard convincing on that one. She thinks it’s all old woman’s fables.

I have still keenly followed the happenings in the world of football.

Although all my three defining soccer moments, that are etched in my mind, did not even take place on the football pitch, no. Ironically, they all took place on the same road in Lusaka. 

In April 1994, I watched our golden boys as they rode in the back of an open truck on Great East Road cheered by crowds after coming second at the Africa Cup of Nations. Ironically, I was standing at the same spot where, a year earlier, I had watched with grim shock a cavalcade of 30 military pick-ups roll past, each bearing the remains of our soccer heroes who died in a plane crash in Gabon.
Then came 2012 - our moon-landing experience. I joined bands of excited citizens on the same road to welcome our cup-bearing Chipolopolo.

Yes, we can’t go to the moon, but at least once in two years or so, we go to the Africa Cup and once – yes once upon a glorious time - we did return with our pride packed in a golden cup.

But it all now seems like a wonderful dream, that stars of that glorious moment – Chris Katongo and Stoppila Nsunzu – still walk among us notwithstanding.

How the hell did we sink so low, and become so diminutive and unrecognisable on the continent we once conquered and stamped our foot on?

Dennis Liwewe must be turning in his grave.

Yes, I still remember back in January 2010 sitting in Old Dennis’ living room discussing the beautiful game. It was the most animated interview I have ever conducted, more so when he talked about the enigmatic Godfrey “Ucar”Chitalu.

"Godfrey Chitalu was a centre-forward of yesterday, today and tomorrow," he told me.
"It is coming back, no doubt about it,” he said to me like an old prophet when I asked him about the football spirit of Chitalu’s years. “That is what pleases me most. I'm seeing the rebirth of the Zambian soccer spirit of yester-years. It is coming."

Just days before our meeting, Zambia had been booted out of the Africa Cup tournament in Angola by Nigeria after a penalty shootout. I still remember that night of January 25, 2010, and the Thomas Nyirenda epic penalty miss that sealed our fate.

But of course Old Dennis was right, that spirit did return two years later, although in a very fleeting manner.

For the record, Zambia have been to every Africa Cup (with only a few exceptions) since their inaugural participation in 1974 during which they even settled for silver after the twice-played final against Zaire.

Since then, they have huffed and puffed, getting bronze in 1982, 1990 and 1996. Between 1974 and 2012, Zambia had made participation at the biennial tournament a non-debatable issue; one where qualification was guaranteed.

Zambia had built a name as one of Africa's best teams, with the now lonely and almost neglected Independence Stadium a fortress; a place no country would want to play at.

The Cameroon of Emmanuel Kunde came, they were wired; Egypt of Ahmed El Kass came and went back crying; Ghana came with their Abedi Pele but lost and so did the Bafana Bafana-captained by Neil Tovey with Doctor Khumalo in tow.

Zaire came with their Bwanga Tshimen and they were butchered and so were Zimbabwe led by Shacky Tauro.

The Independence Stadium - put loosely - was a slaughter house. Zambia, then known by the moniker KK11, were a revered side taking on the likes of Italy.

Then came Andrew Kamanga at FAZ, and our beautiful game became all fuzzy.

Watching AFCON without Zambia shows how low our soccer standards have plummeted.

From the glorious years, fast forward to 2022, Zambia are distant bystanders as the Africa Cup tournament is being played by half the continent. Even some tiny countries are in Cameroon while the once mighty Zambia are home, reduced to cheering Comoros (who even knows where that is?), Malawi and Ethiopia. Damn!

Yes, you and I have been relegated to fighting for remote controls with our kids who would rather watch Disney Junior.

Looked at critically, it's some sort of football travesty orchestrated by ourselves; yes the 18 million Zambians who have contrived to get to the abyss of the game we so much love.

How did we get to a point where Zambia miss out on three consecutive AFCON tournaments and coincidentally under the stewardship of Kamanga?

Something is amiss and from what I have gathered, the football family is divided right in the middle, with the leadership focusing more on self-preservation than football development. Or those in charge have little or no idea about football development.

Zambia have sufficient quality to qualify and compete at the Africa Cup of Nations. Need I mention Patson Daka, Enock Mwepu and Fashion Sakala and their exploits in the United Kingdom?

So, quite clearly, there is something wrong about our football and it's difficult to look beyond Football House.

And to imagine that Kamanga will tonight retire to bed and peacefully sleep is such a disturbing thought.

Which reminds me of 2004, when Everisto Kasunga refused to stand for re-election as FAZ president after Zambia failed to qualify for the 2004 tournament. What mark of integrity!

Someone really bruised our ego, and it hurts.

For now keep quarreling with Junior over the remote control and explain to him why Zambia aren't in Cameroon.

Clearly our football is beyond the literal crossroads; it's chosen a route that leads to complete destruction. What we now need is resurrection.

For comments email: jzimba@daily-mail.co.zm, jackzimba777@gmail.com, WhatsApp line 0979309545