Remember the late 80s TV sitcom show Who’s the Boss? starring Tony Danza? That is exactly what the PSL is hell-bent on proving to Kaizer Chiefs by reinstating the disciplinary committee (DC) charges after the club failed to honour its two Covid-19-affected matches in December.
What does the PSL hope to gain, after all? Its integrity, I hasten to say.
For the record, the beleaguered Amakhosi lost both Premiership matches to Golden Arrows and Cape Town City by the same 2-1 margins after the Safa arbitrator Nazeem Cassim SC ruled that the matches be rescheduled and played.
So, what in the name of football does the PSL mean by declaring that the Chiefs arbitration ruling has been set aside and the club must face the full might of the league’s DC on Tuesday to be charged for their no-show. Simple, the public has come to question the very existence of the league’s Covid-19 rules.
Again, it boggles the mind why the Chiefs case was taken off the DC roll in the first place, soon after the arbitrator ruled against the league and finding in its award that Amakhosi were within their rights not to honour the matches as lives were at stake. We cannot have a parallel legal process, the PSL argues.
And, according to the PSL, the review in the high court nullified the award by Cassim and set it aside. Once again, what does the league have to gain, if
anything, as Chiefs have played the matches, as per the ruling by the arbitrator, and lost?
Simply put, the credibility and the might of the PSL disciplinary procedures are at stake.
Another potential explanation for all this toing and froing by the league is its show of force. Who’s the boss?
Oh, there is another motive at play: the two affected clubs, Arrows and City, did not take kindly to the fact the matches were rescheduled; they were hoping to be awarded walkovers and three points without kicking a ball because, after all, that is one of the rules in the NSL/PSL rulebook for failure to show up and play a scheduled match.
City boss John Comitis is also in hot water as we speak. The vocal Comitis publicly expressed his displeasure with the arbitrator’s ruling, declaring the award “a sad day for South African football” and he is now facing the full might of the DC.
That said, the PSL is trying hard to appease its detractors who are pointing a finger at the league for exercising different strokes for different folks.
Remember the case of now-defunct second tier outfit Cape Umoya last season?
Without doubt, the integrity and the credibility of the PSL’s rules have been questioned and interrogated since Cape Umoya’s request to have their fixture against Cape Town Spurs postponed in the 2020/21 National First Division season was rejected.
Consequently, Cape Umoya forfeited the three points and Spurs were handed a 3-0 walkover result.
Unfortunately for Chiefs they are victims of the league’s dilly dallying in applying its own rules.
It must be noted, that besides Comitis, the PSL is under fire from a number fronts for not sticking its Covid-19 rules in the case of Chiefs. The rules were put in place to circumvent clubs’ failure to honour matches if the team has Covid-19 related cases.
One of those regulations states unequivocally that no club must make Covid-19 an excuse, but most significantly, the PSL lacked foresight of a grave situation, an exceptional case involving the whole squad, including support staff at Chiefs’ The Village in Naturena were all affected and that is the very reason Cassim SC awarded a replay.
Or is it a case of Chiefs being bigger than Cape Umoya? Be the judge.
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