Dynamos narrowly escaped being kicked out of the CAF Confederation Cup over a 2016 case involving US$27 000 owed to former striker, Evans Gwekwerere.
Under the new CAF licencing requirements, Dynamos would have been denied a licence for the 2024/25 tournament which gets underway next month.
It has emerged that Dynamos had not honoured a High Court order from 2018 while Gwekwerere, with help from the Footballers Union of Zimbabwe, could not find any property belonging to the club to attach.
A window finally opened when Dynamos entered the CAF Confederation Cup as it opened an avenue for Gwekwerere to enforce the High Court order.
Faced with the possibility of a late exclusion from the tournament, the club leadership then engaged Gwekwerere leading to a compromise where the striker reduced his demands to US$20 000.
Gwekwerere had four different stints with the club and was owed bonuses and related fees amounting to $27 000.
With the help of the Football Union of Zimbabwe, he approached CAF who were ready to block the club from participating in the Confederation Cup.
Before the granting of a licence to participate in the CAF tournaments, the following elements are considered at each club: Sporting infrastructure, Personnel and Administrative, Legal, and Financial.
Clubs have to successfully prove they have no disputes related to the overdue payables in the financial criteria to comply with the CAF men's club licencing regulations.
Zimpapers Sports understands members of the Dynamos executive had to run around and source the money, which they paid him US$17 000 and agreed the remainder had to be paid in batches within three months.
"The parties involved negotiated that the club was going to pay the player US$20 000 in total, instead of US$27 000.
"The initial payment was made from the money raised from the gate takings when they hosted Highlanders," revealed a source close to the club.
The official added:
"To be precise it is only one player, not three and it is Evans. He had a special case that went through the courts and he won his case a long way back.
"Since then, the club hasn't come forward to pay him his dues and the current executive just inherited that debt. The issue was overlooked long back and the club failed to comply with the court order all these years.
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"The player approached FUZ, which we believe advised him to report the case to CAF ahead of our participation in the Confed Cup.
"Nowadays the rules don't allow teams to participate in competitions when they have debts and owe players money and we believe Evans and FUZ took advantage of that and approached CAF.
"This situation meant the club was going to fail the criteria for club licencing and we weren't going to participate in the African Safari.
"With issues like this out in the public domain, everyone was going to believe that the club had failed to participate due to the financial crisis hence the executive had to run around and find solutions to the problem at hand before it was too late.
"The club has some perennial problems that many don't see but they make the day-to-day business of the club difficult. It becomes difficult to run things smoothly, and this was the case with Evans.
"So, after the issue was brought to the club's attention the club opted for an out-of-court settlement and we agreed with Evans under the eye of FUZ.
All this happened during the days of Norman Maroto's funeral.
"And the other thing is that the club agreed to pay some of the money in instalments."
Dynamos are set to face Zambian side Zesco in a two-legged first preliminary round between August 16 and 25.
