Manyuchi, Nancy and Sundry

Watching Charles Manyuchi battle Patrick Allotey for the WBC Welterweight title, I was left with more than my fair share of frustration at how the fight panned out. Despite some animated and loud promotion  of the fight, it yielded little in the way of excitement and felt more like one of those comedy shows that is not funny. And is often the case in such a comedy show, the audience swiftly find something else to amuse themselves with.

Thankfully, the curtain raiser went some way towards justifying the boxing bout’s value for money. The irrepressible Catherine Phiri in the space of three two minute rounds, managed to so bewilder her German opponent ( I need to say I have seen better looking Germans in my life) with a barrage of punches that she was lucky to only hit the canvas four times. Which times the umpire thought were enough to hand the bout and the belt to Catherine Phiri.

Now I like Catherine. She speaks very good English and her wide mouth is a treasure in the parts that I hail from. However, how she juggles a budding boxing career and the rigours of school is largely a mystery to me. The few people I have consulted seem to be leaning towards the fact that women are endowed with a unique ability to multi-task that men can never fully comprehend. To many, it doesn’t matter. She boxes good, and that is all that matters. I suppose I need to look at the bigger picture.

I wish I could say the same about Charles Manyuchi, whose prematch routine of “reading” the Bible baffles me at best and is a waste of time at worst. Perhaps his actions are in keeping with Knights errants of old who committed themselves to God and their chosen mistress before embarking on any type of combat. But let us not get ahead of ourselves, I wonder what prayers Manyuchi offers as he reads the bible.. “God give me strength to beat the brains out of one of your creatures?’.

What you do get with Manyuchi is entertainment, bordering on the comical and absurd. Unfortunately you need more than that to be a good boxer. On this occasion, he came out flying, his limbs splaying like and Octopus, indiscriminately throwing punches with such rapidity you would think he was fighting both Allotey and his imaginary friends. Unfortunately, it turned out that Allottey contrary to the cast of boxers that has often blessed Zambia with their presence for similar fights , was actually a somewhat decent boxer. Landing a few decent punches on Manyuchi as he tried to wind his famous windmill punch. Of course the windmill punch is a crowd favourite and so is the jig of the hips and the thrusting of an unguarded face into the opponent.  While these rather eccentric tricks draw crowd adulation, Manyuchi should take care that they don’t end up defining him as it happened in his fight with Allotey. He needs to be a boxer first and foremost, and if he feels he cannot do away with the clowning, let him keep it to the very bare minimum. If indeed he aims at facing Floyd Mayweather, he might as well start now preparing.

In the end though, we have to thank the zealous South African umpire for … well not ruining the match… it had already slipped into a phase so boring Garfield would be envious) but for bringing it to such an unsatisfactory end. Poor Manyuchi did not know whether to celebrate or cry. Here was a winner who didn’t feel like they had won. Allotey on  the other was a powder keg of fury claiming he had been robbed of victory. I hope a re-match is organized soon.

And while we are on the subject of winners and losers, I wish to congratulate my friend Nancy Nchimunya Handabile for the recognition her work on Love Games received. She was nominated for African Magic Viewers Choice Awards best supporting actress in a TV series or drama for her portrayal of ‘Progress”, a Tonga maid who ends up being impregnated by the man of the house. Personally I find it highly satisfying that the audience warmed up to Progress in the midst of the fake American accents and Brazilian hair portrayed by other characters. Progress mixes vernacular and English making for interesting conversation that can only be as a result of Nancy's skills at improvisation. As someone who has often spoken about how vacuous, superficial and lacking in depth most of our local programming is, Nancy’s character is a breath of fresh air.

So here is to Nancy and as someone who knows what you are capable of, I can safely say, there is more where that came from.