Johannesburg – The cold war between Safa and the PSL has once again come to the fore, diverting attention from football, as we know it to be played on pitches, and taking it to the luxurious, air-conditioned offices – read headquarters – the men and women soccer bosses in silky suits enjoy while trampling on their own constitution and cases ending up in courts.
At the centre of the latest dispute is the matter pertaining to the referees’ awards that were not announced at last Sunday’s annual PSL Awards, as is the norm.
The second burning issue is the debacle involving the National First Division’s GladAfrica Championship court row, concluded this weekend at the Joburg high court when Judge Roland Sutherland declared Sekhunene United the winners, thus gaining to the PSL’s top flight Premiership division.
Sekhukhune have been awarded the three points they so rightly deserve.
Also read: Babina Noko gain promotion to the PSL’s Premiership after court ruling
In the matter invoving the referees, the PSL has put the blame at the door of Safa for the referees’ awards that were shelved after the PSL accused Safa of not providing it with the nominees and winners timeously.
So, what went wrong? Who is fooling who?
Safa responded to the accusation of failing to meet the deadline to submit the names for the referee and assistant referee categories in time for the recorded event.
On the day of the announcement of the winners, the PSL released a statement stating the reasons for the exclusion of the referees’ awards, two hours before the beaming of the event on TV.
The country’s professional wing, the PSL, is accusing its mother body of sabotaging the awards by only submitting nominees the night before the awards, last Saturday, while the deadline was for the Saturday before – a week in advance. Safa would have none of it.
Nonsense, retorted the football association in retaliation.
“It was almost impossible to meet the close deadline … to blame the association for not meeting the unrealistic deadline is being disingenuous,” came a furious response from Safa head of referees Abdul Ebrahim.
It is a well-known fact that the PSL 2020/21 season was extended by a week, and the awards were held a week after the last eight matches of the season were played, marking the crowning of Mamelodi Sundowns as fourtime PSL champions and league title holders in a row.
The bottom line is that Safa is not prepared to shoulder the blame for the delay in the ending of the PSL season by a week. However, crucially, another PSL promotions saga was playing itself out at the high court.
Riverting back to the promotion matter, the rigmarole was resolved in a court of law and Sekhukhune are the PSL newcomers.
But all this should have been decided on the field of play. When Sekhukhune United protested, their grievance was upheld and were awarded three points after Polokwane City were sanctioned for breaking the rules, relegating businesswoman Shauwn Mkhize, aka MamMkhize’s Royal A M to being runners-ups, qualifying for play-offs.
The PSL disciplinary committee initially found City guilty of contravening the NSL-PSL handbook rules after they failed to include five Under-23 players in their team sheet against Sekhukhune in January.
The inept PSL body took a good five months to conclude the case, leading to it influencing the outcome of the promotion to the top-flight Premiership, days before the end of the season. Safa put its foot down, arguing that the PSL must abide by the arbitrator’s award and allocate the three points to Sekhukhune and we have new champions from the north.
Sparks flew when Safa lambasted the PSL: “…it smacks of arrogance and it’s further presumptuous that the arbitration award by advocate Hilton [SC] will be set aside.”
That said, we’ve long alluded to the PSL being the tail wagging the dog in the form of Safa, instead of the scenario being the other way round.
When will this mudslinging end? When Safa president Danny Jordaan and PSL chair Irvin Khoza step down, I presume.
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