The ManicaPost
Ray Bande Senior Sports Reporter —
| CONFUSION over the number of teams that will be promoted into the Castle Lager Premier League and those that should be relegated as well as the format for promotion seems far from being over as the issue is expected to feature prominently in an extra ordinary indaba set for tomorrow at Rainbow Towers in Harare. |
The meeting starts at 10am.
The problematic issue all started at the national Zifa Extra-ordinary General Meeting which was held in Harare in October 2015 and successfully sought to revoke the mandate of Cuthbert Dube as Zifa president and at the same meeting a resolution was made to the effect that Premier Soccer League would relegate two teams and two teams from the four second tier leagues would be promoted through playoffs.
The resolution also spelt out that Premier Soccer League would cater for the playoffs expenses that include transport, accommodation and food as well as the fact that the games would be screened live on pay per view channel, SuperSport.
The Premier Soccer League then abruptly made a U turn saying they were not in a position to fund the playoffs, thereby sparking fierce debate over the Premiership promotion modalities.
But when the PSL indicated they could not afford to bankroll the promotion play-offs, the Zifa congress decided to revert to the old system to relegate four teams and promote four.
The decision was not welcomed by the PSL who felt it was not in line with the tenets of Fair Play as it was communicated with just two matches remaining in the 2016 league programme.
This has led to confusion as Chapungu and Tsholotsho, who finished third and fourth from the bottom, are still not sure of their status next season.
Interestingly, some sections have now proposed an enlarged Premiership league that would have 20 teams for the 2017 season and then map the way forward for 2018.
20 teams would accommodate all the teams that were in the Premiership in the 2016 season plus the four regional champions.
Zifa Eastern Region chairman Davison Muchena said he would not have problems with having an enlarged Premiership league given the deadlock that is prevailing.
“Late last year we had a meeting in which we tried to resolve this issue but failed. There were four regional chairpersons, four PSL emergency committee representatives with Zifa board member as the chairman. As regional chairpersons we proposed that PSL relegate two since they had already made communication to their affiliates to that effect and they also promote all our four regional chairpersons. PSL refused adamantly saying they would not want an enlarged PSL. They insisted on promoting two. Therefore, meeting did not resolve anything since participants were not ready to shift from their positions and meet halfway.
“That is the latest information I know about this promotion, relegation confusion. Therefore we are going to meet in Harare on Saturday (tomorrow) hopefully we will be able to grind a solution for the sake of the progress of the game of football,” said the Chiredzi based football administrator.
The introduction of playoffs has long been a bone of contention with advocates for the idea arguing that it would help reduce the number of clubs relegated from the Premiership from four to two.
For long, critics have spoken against the idea of relegating four teams from the Premiership at the end of each season – relegating exactly 25 percent of the league each year.
On the other hand, others have argued against the introduction of playoffs citing their proneness to controversial match officiating and match fixing.
Interestingly, some sections have now proposed an enlarged Premiership league that would have 20 teams for the 2017 season and then map the way forward for 2018.
