Friday, March 29, 2024

Reverential salute for referee Janny Sikazwe

TALK UP:

It has been a piecemeal but certainly to culmination as referee Janny Sikazwe became the first Zambian to handle a FIFA World Cup match. From a conventional whistle-man in the Zambian flagship league to overseeing the final ties of both the 2016 Club World Cup and the 2017 Afcon; subsequent the 2018 FIFA World Cup clash involving Belgium and Panama in Russia.

The foregoing monumental in the referee’s annals, an archive that has been beyond the reach of the Zambia national football team (Chipolopolo). Reason why until now Zambia wouldn’t be mentioned in same breadth and the mondial.

It is not a perchance, the teacher by professional Sikazwe unequivocally has earned it to be among the pantheon of aristocrats in the Zambian football arena. Alongside him talk of most revered names like Dennis Liwewe, Kalusha Bwalya and Godfrey Chitalu.

Yesterday, when his face appeared on the telly – when the Belgium skipper and Chelsea midfielder Eden Hazard came forth to greet him – millions of Zambians went hubristic and clogged social media platforms with massages pregnant with conceit.

Who can blame them? It’s the apogee anyone of their countrymen has ever been intertwined to this level – at a time when no referee from England was entrusted with the role of calling the shots with the whistle by FIFA.

It felt like Zambia was in action, against who cares; Belgium or Panama. The mainstay is that their national flag of the colours Green, Black, Orange and Red was shown in the outset.

In fact, the whistle-man upstaged everything from the outset until the end. The pundits depth analysis were about how Janny Sikazwe fared and not the actual match.

You can not just comprehend this encomium when your country has never qualified to the football’s grandest stage of them all. When until then, save for journalists and a commentator, there has been nonentity of any of your countryman to have ever been intertwined at the mondial.

And notwithstanding the uncharted waters, Sikazwe was unlike someone who is wet behind the ears at this stage. He was cosy and stood his ground even when it meant putting the nose out of joint for whoever was malevolent.

Janny Sikazwe’s colossus heralds an auspicious in the offing vis-à-vis refereeing in this country. After him is a bevy of upcoming referees that shall as well aim to break the ceiling.

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14 Comments

  1. Sikazwe did a very good job yesterday. Congrats to him and all fans of the Chipolopolo!

    On a separate note, does anyone know why Prosper Chiluya has not been playing the last few matches for his side Bethlehem in the USA? He played extremely well in May but has been sitting on the bench in June.

    • Haha was just wondering about that as well. It’s been a while since I had to pull up a discretionary to get what the heck the blurb was all about. Regardless I had my comic relief.

  2. Chizungu maningi,these terminologies in the write-up do not suit SOCIAL MEDIA please. Kwati mulembela ma intellectuals sure.

  3. What a pile of terminologies. They some what distorted the information.Simple english ba zamfoot, otherwise congrats to Jani.

  4. THE FOOTBALL ASSOCIATION OF ZAMBIA.
    ALICK NKHATA ROAD
    LUSAKA.

    3RD JUNE,2018.

    REPORT ON POOR OFFICIATING FOR SOME REFEREES IN DIVISION ONE – EASTERN PROVINCE.

    On 2nd June,2018 there was a Division ONE match played between Chipata City Council Fc and Katete Rangers Fc which kicked off at 15:00hrs . This match took place at DAVID KAUNDA (D.K) Stadium in Chipata.
    The complaints are that the Centre REFEREE was very biased favoring the home team, 90percent of the decisions he made against the visiting team(Katete Rangers) were wrong.
    He gave a false penalty to Chipata City Council, fake fouls against Rangers, two players for Katete Rangers were fouled simultaneously unfortunately he didn’t blew the whitle and it took him three minutes to stop the game after pressure from the fans and players. Again for those players to return to the field of play he didn’t allow them until about 10 minutes after massive pressure from Players and Soccer âš½ fans and this time fans almost caused chaos and the Police ? had to maintain peace and order in controlling the situation and that’s when the referee allowed the two players who were injured to join the play.
    In addition, he was giving Corner kicks to Chipata city Fc for their own misplaced balls instead of free Kicks to Katete Rangers fc.
    Other notable actions by the referee are that several times when the ball rolls out of play by a Chipata City council player the referee gives the Chipata City council throw in instead of giving it Katete Rangers; On this day the main objectives of this referee was to rescue the Hosting Team.

    May we know if FAZ train these match officials before they can be approved to handle these games! It was like we were watching the game in the village and not a FAZ calendar ? match which are manned by rules and regulations.

    Do the Division ONE games have Match Official who can handle these negativities which spoils our good game of football in the country.

    I think this is why some of these village referees do not progress in their careers ( Are they corrupt or it’s just their desire to support the local clubs? ) The rules of the referee are that they don’t need to be a supporter of any of the two teams he/she is officiating because it disadvantages the visiting team.Or the other Team.

    Therefore, we are asking FAZ to take this complaint seriously because if such wrong trends are torareted in Football it will destroy the good image of Zambian referees accross the globe.

    Yours sincerely,
    Concerned Soccer âš½ Lover.
    Ellias Siyanjere Tembo – Chipata.

  5. Congratulations to the great Jan Sikazwe! Our own country – man carrying our national flag!

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