PHEW! Finally a medal was delivered at the Olympic Games ending a 28-year drought and the celebrations and accolades showered on Muzala Samukonga are justified as the country has surely been starved of success at this event since the exploits of Samuel Matete.
Though it is somewhat sad that a country, soon to celebrate its 60 years, can only boost of three medals with Gold still elusive.
To bring you up to speed, lightweight boxer Keith Mwila won Zambia's first medal at the Los Angeles 1984 Games before Matete delivered silver at the Atlanta 1996 Games in the 400m hurdles.
Since then, the country had tried and tumbled at the Olympic Games and it had to take the exceptional talent of Muzala, the Commonwealth 2022 Games 400m winner and former African champion, to break the jinx.
So in as much as celebrations can be enjoyed at the moment with the bronze win, there is need for the country through our sports administrators to correct the wrongs and ensure Zambia start performing well at the Olympic Games and challenge for medals like Gold and silver, of course even bronze matters.
Muzala is one athlete that shown his capabilities from the time be blast into the scene at the African Championships in Mauritius where he won gold before stunning the world with his breath-taking run in Birmingham to become the Commonwealth champion.
Injuries did Muzala no favour as they kept him away from competing at the World Championship but came back strongly to help the relay team win gold at the African Games to secure Olympic qualification then claimed silver at the African Senior Championships to surrender the gold he won previously.
Muzala becomes an interesting example of an athlete who never gives up despite the many challenges faced including failure to motive him and other athletes alike.
The stage Muzala has reached needs him to be fully focussed on the sport unlike him thinking of unpaid allowances which is a demotivating factor especially as he chats with his friends who get perks way far off from what is given to the Zambian athletes.
In as much as our economy cannot allow us to compete with the US$37,500 some countries are paying their gold medal winners, it is important to fulfil the meagre allowances promised to our athletes as that would greatly help in motivating them and especially runners like Muzala.
A lot of pledges have been made and it is every Zambian hope these will be fulfilled than companies and individuals who make these pledged to disappear in thin air after getting mileage after the promises.
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Onus will equally be on the Zambia Athletics to ensure it invests more in Muzala by, if possible, sending him to the United States or finding him a scholarship that should see him improve his talent and regularly compete with these world great runners.
Muzala needs to become a regular feature of the Diamond League and not the All Comers Meet-that should now be way below our star runner because he needs to compete with the best to become the best himself and deliver that elusive gold.
We need to reach a point where we can have a competitor in almost all the events such as 100m, 200m, 800m, 1500 including the 5000m races and not forgetting the other track and field events like long and high jump, shot-put, javelin and various marathons and race walks.
This equally applies to other sports disciplines who need to start building medal winning athletes and not just sending them to make up numbers.
Competing at various competitions will be key for our boxers, judokas and football teams if they are to reach the levels required to win medals at the Olympic and Commonwealth Games and help that thirsty for medals such that winning bronze becomes a normal.
Remember no one remembers the person or team that finishes second but the one that wins the ultimate top prize.
Wishing you all a wonderful sporting weekend and looking forward to our relay team performing well with the Muzala factor coming in.
I will surely publish the comments/feedback from last week column for wanted to dedicate this week to our hero Muzala kindly bear with me but let's continue interacting via eliaschipepo@gmail.com
