Several Dynamo footballers risk CAF ban after drug test


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Dynamos FC players will undergone a random drug test before the CAF Champions league clash against Egyptian giants Zamalek tomorrow.

The Zimbabwean side has to win to progress to the semis.

A Ugandan doctor, James Sekajugo, arrived in Harare this morning to carry out the anti-doping control exercise before the Dynamos-Zamalek match.

Zamalek, five time winners of the competition jetted in on Friday.

Two players per team, selected at random, will be tested by CAF’s anti-doping control unit and apart from being withdrawn from the game, players caught using banned substances will be severely punished.

The Dynamos players highly vulnerable to Caf’s anti-doping control are those who are in a habit of smoking mbanje.

According to medical experts, mbanje stays in the body for about six weeks and this means that a Dynamos player who smoked the drug after August 16 will be in trouble if taken for tomorrow’s test.

Nick Munyonga, a member of the Zifa medical commission and head of the Zimbabwe Olympic Committee’s medical commission, said this week that while levels are used on other drugs, it is different with mbanje.

Mere detection that a player smoked mbanje is enough to warrant sanctions.

Not to say that there are definite smokers in the Dynamos squad, mbanje is known to be a widely abused drug by most soccer players in the country.

Mbanje is said to give a smoker extra energy and bravery during a match although the abusers tend to stand out as the worst behaved.

While the drug test is random on paper, analysts say the trend has been to pick on those players with dark lips, which are usually associated with smoking mbanje.

Already, two sets of Dynamos players underwent the drug test before Group A matches against Zamalek and ASEC Mimosas away.

Dynamos became the first local team to undergo a drug test as this exercise, which was adopted by the Caf’s organising committee for inter-club competitions in 2003, only takes place in the group stages of inter-club competitions.

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