Sports / Soccer
Zimbabwe Warriors fails to secure air-tickets for Guinea trip
14 Jun 2013 at 06:17hrs | Views
ZIFA were left with egg on their face yesterday after the Warriors failed to leave, as scheduled, for their 2014 World Cup qualifier against Guinea in yet another embarrassing administrative boob by the association.
The country's football controlling body failed to secure air-tickets on time for the Warriors' delegation to fly from Harare to Conakry.
The trip to West Africa, which had been scheduled for yesterday, was cancelled at the last minute.
Zimbabwe's 33-member delegation was supposed to leave at 1:30pm yesterday via Johannesburg where they would have connected to Dakar, Senegal, in the evening and arrive in Conakry this morning.
The journey, however, could not materialise as the association had not secured enough air tickets and frantic efforts were still being made, through the Zimbabwe Football Trust, to ensure the team leaves today.
It was not clear yesterday whether the team will be able to travel or not, but officials at Zifa House said everything was now on course, after the problems they encountered yesterday, for the team to leave for their West African assignment today.
The new arrangement would mean that they will arrive in Conakry tomorrow morning and then have a single practice session at the match venue, just 24 hours before kick-off.
The match has been scheduled for 5pm (Zimbabwean time) on Sunday.
Zifa chief executive Jonathan Mashingaidze spent the better part of the day running around trying to rescue the mission and was not available for comment.
Zifa president, Cuthbert Dube, who has been the sole saviour of the association among the board members, when it comes to injecting funds to service the operations of the organisation, is away in Brazil.
The country's football controlling body failed to secure air-tickets on time for the Warriors' delegation to fly from Harare to Conakry.
The trip to West Africa, which had been scheduled for yesterday, was cancelled at the last minute.
Zimbabwe's 33-member delegation was supposed to leave at 1:30pm yesterday via Johannesburg where they would have connected to Dakar, Senegal, in the evening and arrive in Conakry this morning.
The journey, however, could not materialise as the association had not secured enough air tickets and frantic efforts were still being made, through the Zimbabwe Football Trust, to ensure the team leaves today.
It was not clear yesterday whether the team will be able to travel or not, but officials at Zifa House said everything was now on course, after the problems they encountered yesterday, for the team to leave for their West African assignment today.
The new arrangement would mean that they will arrive in Conakry tomorrow morning and then have a single practice session at the match venue, just 24 hours before kick-off.
The match has been scheduled for 5pm (Zimbabwean time) on Sunday.
Zifa chief executive Jonathan Mashingaidze spent the better part of the day running around trying to rescue the mission and was not available for comment.
Zifa president, Cuthbert Dube, who has been the sole saviour of the association among the board members, when it comes to injecting funds to service the operations of the organisation, is away in Brazil.
Source - herald
