Young Africans SC president and chairman of the newly established African Clubs Association (ACA), Engineer Hersi Ally Said, is the latest reputable football boss to call on Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates to establish their women teams.
Chiefs and Pirates are probably two of the biggest clubs in Africa that have yet to establish women’s football teams.
Mamelodi Sundowns, TS Galaxy, Royal AM, and recently SuperSport United, who partnered with Tshwane University of Technology, are the only clubs in the Premier Soccer League that have women’s teams.
Speaking to the South African Football Journalists Association at the Capital Hotel in Sandton, north of Johannesburg, on Wednesday, Ally Said emphasised the importance of big clubs on the African continent having women’s teams, especially the Chiefs and Pirates.
Fastest-growing sport
“As far as I understand, there is compliance licencing for clubs put out by the CAF [Confederation of African Football], that you must have a women’s team,” Ally Said responded to Sunday World.
“In the next few years, they will be very strict that they [the Chiefs and Pirates] must have women’s teams, because on the club licencing there is that element that you must have a women’s team for you to participate in the CAF competitions.
“And I am sure in the next few years that they [the CAF] will put it as a standard condition that you can’t participate in the tournaments if you don’t have a women’s team registered.
“So, they must have; you cannot have a big team and not have a women’s team; it’s very important that they do because women’s football is one of the fastest-growing sport in the world, and there is no way we can run away from that.”
Previously, the likes of former Banyana Banyana star Simphiwe Dludlu, Sundowns Ladies coach Jerry Tshabalala, and Minister of Sport, Arts, and Culture Zizi Kodwa, among others, have publicly come out to lay stress on why it is crucial for the Soweto giants to have a female version of their teams.
