Standard|The guessing game is over as to who will coach the Warriors in their 2022 World Cup and 2021 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) engagements after the Zimbabwe Football Association (Zifa) settled for Croatian Zdravco Logarusic.

Whether this was a good decision or not, is something else, but the answer will only be known from the Warriors’ results on the field of play and the overall performance of the team.

That Zifa chose Logarusic instead of the other 11 high-profile coaches means they saw something in him which all of us will only come to see or know when the former Go Mahia frontman takes up his job.

What, however, is clear is that Logarusic does not have a history in coaching national teams apart from Sudan where his attachment there is not that impressive.

Between February 2018 and before his departure from Khartoum in November 2019, Sudan played 10 games, won three — one of them against little Chad — drew one and lost five.

In fact, Logarusic has been — in Africa — more involved at club level where he handled AFC Leopards and Go Mahia in Kenya, Simba SC in Tanzania and Asante Kotoko in Ghana and on all occasions, he did not leave on the best of terms.

So all logic points to the fact that Logarusic would have been best suited to coaching the likes of Caps United, Dynamos, Cranborne Bullets, Highlanders, Yadah, or Manica Diamonds, rather than the Warriors, who have far much bigger challenges than what the Croatian has faced in his coaching career.

What is also evident is that Logarusic has not lasted the distance of his contract in most of the jobs he has taken up as happened at Go Mahia, AFC Leopards and Asante Kotoko, and there is no guarantee that he will not dump the Warriors in the middle of a campaign.

Nobody knows what really motivated Zifa to bring Logarusic on board, but the truth is that Joey Antipas was a far much better candidate for this job than the Croatian.

It should also be placed on record that in the six games Antipas was in charge of the Zimbabwe Warriors in 2019, he won three, drew two and lost only one of those matches.

History also shows that Zimbabwe has been more successful under local coaches Sunday Chidzambwa, Charles Mhlauri, and Kalisto Pasuwa, than the imports from Brazil, Switzerland, Germany, Scotland, Poland, and Ghana, who came on board and failed.

What is even interesting is the fact that Chidzambwa, Mhlauri and Pasuwa brought success while earning little and with limited resources, yet the foreigners failed when they and their players were living in the lap of luxury.

So, what Logarusic will do will be judged against what Chidzambwa, Mhlauri and Pasuwa did, and failure to take the Warriors to the Nations Cup finals would be viewed as a waste of time and resources on the Croatian,
The question is: Why has all of a sudden Zimbabwe gone back to the system of picking up foreign coaches who have never coached top European clubs before coming to Africa?

Why has Zifa abandoned the proven “sons of the soil” practice which over the years has seen Zimbabwe qualify for the Nations Cup?

Such foreign coaches — it has been observed — are only interested in huge salaries and good contracts and their real sense of nationalism is with their countries instead of the gospel of “I love Zimbabwe or Africa” that they preach.

This point was amply demonstrated at the 1990 World Cup in Italy where the Indomitable Lions of Cameroon were whitewashed 4-0 by Russia.

The Lions’ Russian coach Valeri Nepomniachi had convincingly feigned an appearance of deep disappointment after the match, until Cameroon officials actually saw him celebrating with his countrymen, hours later.

At USA 94, tension rose in the Nigerian Super Eagles camp when — at some point — it seemed Nigeria would play the Netherlands — coach Clemens Westerhof’s home side.

The Nigerians arranged to have Westerhof replaced by a Nigerian coach — Amado Shuaibu — for that match, which fortunately enough, did not take place after the Super Eagles were eliminated in the earlier round.

However, there is another school of thought that believes that coaches like Logarusic are technically advanced and are also “susceptible” to the factors of bias and player favouritism which local coaches are usually associated with.

They are also seen to command the respect of both the players and the fans as well as the administrators who do not hesitate to pay out huge bonuses as demanded by the coach.

Whatever the case is, it is good that the Warriors now have a coach to guide them through Afcon 2021 and the 2022 World Cup and what is needed is to give the team and the coach all the support they need.

What is important is for Logarusic to justify why he was selected out of the 11 other high-profile coaches who submitted their letters to be considered for this job by delivering results which will make Zimbabweans even happier.

As former Bayern Munich and Warriors coach the late Rudi Gutendorf once put it: “The national team is the pride and display window of the nation. There is nothing than can thrill the nation more than the success of their national team when playing international matches.”

So far, Zimbabwean football followers are happy with their national team having made it to the 2019 Afcon finals and also currently sitting in a comfortable second position in the run-up to Afcon 2021.

The Warriors are also on their way to the finals of the Africa Nations Championships (Chan) in Cameroon in June as well as being in the group stages of the 2022 World Cup — all having come in a short space of time.

The onus is now on Logarusic to continue that legacy or else Zimbabweans will have no one to blame, but those who brought the 54-year-old to Zimbabwe in the first place.

There is no question that the Warriors changing room floods with internationally renowned players in the form of Marvelous Nakamba, Tino Kadewere, Knowledge Musona, Khama Billiat and Marshall Munetsi and failure can only be attributed to the coach, and not lack of talent.

As Zimbabwe gears up for the 2021 Nations Cup and 2022 World Cup battles, it is in the hope that Zifa will not regret dumping Antipas in favour of the former Asante Kotoko handler.