By Sheldon Hakata
IT is hard to talk about Dynamos or the Zimbabwe national team without the name Sunday Chidzambwa cropping up. Called ‘Mhofu’ by his legion of fans, Chidzambawa’s status as a giant of local football is unquestionable.
His successes with the national team in Southern African competitions earned him the nickname ‘Mr COSAFA’.
For the record, the Zimbabwe national soccer team won six COSAFA titles, four of them with Chidzambwa as head coach. The history-making gaffer won the COSAFA with the national team in 2003, 2009, 2017 and 2018.
The cherry on top was when Chidzambwa became the first coach to lead the Warriors to the AFCON finals hosted by Tunisia in 2004. He repeated the feat in 2019 when he took the team to the same tournament’s finals in Egypt.
Chidzambwa has had some coaching spells with several Southern African pre- miership clubs, notably Black Leopards, Free State Stars and Umtata Bucks.
The biggest moment for him in soccer
will probably be when his favourite Dynamos went all the way to the Club Champions League finals in 1997.
As the first national team captain, he experienced everything from scandals to winning league championships. Chidzambwa was slapped with a life ban on
all soccer-related issues in 2012 together with 14 others following a match-fixing scandal that became known as Asiagate.
However, the ban was lifted in 2016 following a change of administration at ZIFA.
Chidzambwa won six league champi- onships, four of them with Dynamos be- tween 1977 and 1983.
A first winner’s medal came way back in 1973 when he was with his first club, Metal Box.
Unfortunately, Chidzambwa’s playing career ended abruptly in 1983 at Eiffel Flats Stadium in Kadoma.
He was on the receiving end of a crude tackle from Joseph Zulu of Rio Tinto. He was still on top of his game at the age of 31 when he suffered a fractured leg.
Sunday ‘Mhofu ’Chidzambwa’s journey as a soccer player began at a tender age
while herding cattle in the countryside, where he and his friends boy used to kick around a wild fruit called matamba (‘monkey oranges’).
“I used to help my mother herd cat- tle when I was a little boy as my young brother Misheck would be strapped on her back. While there, on the plains, any round object was game enough to kick around,” Chidzambwa told ThePatriot Sport.
Their father, a policeman, bought them a lawn tennis ball and Chidzambwa roped in his brother Misheck. They perfected their skills using the tennis ball.
It was the brothers’ basic rough guide to soccer in the 1950s that set the pace soccer starhood in post-independent Zimbabwe.
Born on May 4 1952, in Mukaro Village, Chivhu, in Chikomba District, Mashona- land East Province, Chidzambwa is the second born in a family of six that also includes another soccer legend, Misheck.
Chidzambwa enrolled at the local Zin- atsa Primary School for Sub A and later moved to Harare with his brother where their policeman father was stationed at Braeside Police Station.
In Standard Three, the young Chid- zambwa was drafted into the school team. He did his Standard Four at Tomlinson Depot where he again made it into the
school team. A year later, he found himself in Bulawayo where he did his Standard Five and Six at Luveve’s Mafakela Govern- ment School. As had become the norm, he was immediately drafted into the school’s first team.
“Those days I played as a striker, which was synonymous with the No. 9 position. They called me ‘Mr Goals’ since I was a speed merchant. I would outpace everyone and score goals for fun,” recalls Chidzambwa.
After completing Standard Six, the nomadic Chidzambwa returned to Salis- bury (now Harare), where he enrolled at Harare Community School, Mbare, for his Forms One and Two. It was while there that he re-invented himself as a defensive midfielder.
But no sooner had he settled down in Harare’s oldest suburb than Chidzamb- wa transferred to Highfield Community School for his ‘O’-Levels. There he met Paul Mushandirwi, a classmate and soccer player who turned out for the now defunct Metal Box, a Division One side.
Mushandirwi asked his friend to join him during his training sessions. The
19-year-old Chidzambwa agreed, and the team’s coaches were soon impressed with his performance while playing as defensive link.
“I joined Metal Box in 1971, and we won promotion to the Super League in 1972.
Our coach was Allan Davey, who also ran a sports shop by the name In-Sport. It was Davey who switched me to centre back (CB) with specific instructions to mark out just one player in a match, anyone wear- ing No. 9 jersey from the opposition. I did my job to perfection and the coach was so impressed CB became my permanent position,” said Chidzambwa in an interview with The Patriot Sport.
In 1975, Chidzambwa joined Chibuku Shumba. The stalwart defender was given a record 500 pounds as signing on fee, which, back then, was quite a princely sum.
The same year he was called up to the national team.
However, his time with Chibuku Shum- ba was shortlived following the team’s dis- bandment. But Harare giants, Dynamos, not only came calling but also appointed him captain as well. The year was 1977.
The following year the Glamour Boys lifted the league title with a stellar cast that included the likes of George ‘Mastermind’ Shaya, Oliver Kateya, Kuda Muchemeyi, Daniel ‘Dhidhidhi’ Ncube, Simon Sachiti, Shepherd Murape, Isaac Nhema, Shadreck Ngwenya, Shaw Handriade and David George, among others.
“During my time at Dynamos, there were no permanent coaches. So, as play- ers, we used to rotate as player-coaches. That is how I mastered the art of coaching,” added Chidzambwa.
The year 1978 was obviously a memorable one for Chidzambwa as he was selected as one the 11 Soccer Stars of the Year for the first time in his blossoming career. The then 26-year-old Chidzambwa emerged as first runner-up to Arcadia striker George Rollo who lifted the cov- eted trophy. Chidzambwa would go on
to appear on the Soccer Stars calendar for six more times after that. Yet another achievement for the record books.
