Simba Bhora

Simba Bhora go into this Zimbabwe Premier Soccer League season as reigning champions, a status that carried them into the 2025–26 CAF Champions League preliminary round, where Nsingizini Hotspurs ended the run.

The championship itself came in 2024, only the club's second year in the top flight, and made Simba Bhora the first side from Mashonaland Central Province to win the national title. Tonderai Ndiraya coached them to it before leaving for Scottland FC, and winger Walter Musona was named Soccer Star of the Year for that campaign; Tymon Machope top-scored with 11 goals.

Promotion had been earned two seasons earlier, in 2022, when Simba Bhora won the Northern Region Soccer League's Division One. That competition is where the club's sharpest rivalries were forged, against Golden Eagles FC and Herentals U20 — fixtures with more edge than anything they have since found against Highlanders FC or FC Platinum in the PSL.

Shamva, the small town in Mashonaland Central where the club is based, gave little indication in 2008 that it would produce a national champion. Simbarashe "Buju" Ndoro founded the side that year as Simba Stars FC, renaming it Simba Bhora in 2019; the nickname, Go Buju Go, still carries his name into the 5,000-capacity Wadzanai Stadium.