A South American coach has now revealed that Jose Mourinho recently advised him to apply for the vacant Zimbabwe national team job.
On 11 July 2023, FIFA confirmed that they had lifted a ban spanning 18 months on the Warriors that saw the side being barred from all of the world football governing body's competitions after the country's national government was found to have interfered in footballing matters.
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This was due to the Sports and Recreation Committee's (SRC) decision to dismiss the entire Zimbabwe Football Association (ZIFA) board from office in 2021.
The nation had thus been suspended from competing in CAF competitions, too, and were not allowed to participate in the ongoing 2023 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers, for which they had been drawn in a group alongside neighbours South Africa, Morocco, and Liberia.
Following the lifting of the ban, FIFA appointed a Normalisation Committee tasked with overseeing ZIFA's operations.
The newly-in-charge body set a deadline of 11 August for those interested in applying for the national team head coach job, and Baltemar Brito, who is currently manager of Zim giants Highlanders FC, has now revealed his application has been put forward by his representatives.
The Brazilian, who previously served as assistant coach to Mourinho at FC Porto and Chelsea, has explained that the now-AS Roma boss insisted that he apply for the role in the Warriors' hot seat.
"We know that our manager applied for this job, for the Warriors job and even this week (last week), I received a call from Jose Mourinho because he read something about the possibility of me being one of the next Warriors coach, and he gave me the support and he gave me the power to accept the challenge if it comes," Brito said, according to Soccer24.
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