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Ricky Zililo Senior Sports Reporter—
THE 2014 edition of the Mbada Diamonds Cup will have a reduced sponsorship package under a new playing format, it has been confirmed. The tournament, whose defending champions are Highlanders, will kickoff at the end of the Premiership race. The Mbada Diamonds Cup, which started in 2011 with Dynamos winning the first two editions before Bosso claimed it last season, has been the country’s richest tournament, running with a budget of a million dollars.
Responding to questions from Chronicle Sport yesterday, PSL chief executive officer Kennedy Ndebele allayed fears that the fourth edition of the Mbada Diamonds Cup hangs in the balance as no tentative dates had been set.
“The Mbada Diamonds Cup is on and we have engaged both the sponsor and PSL board members on the tentative date . We appreciate that our commercial partners’ budgets are compressed and it is pleasing to note that we have a working relationship with Mbada Diamonds that we cherish.
“The clubs are aware about the change of format of the competition and the reduction of the budget that we have to run the competition with. I am not at liberty to divulge the amount involved but even clubs that will not participate in the competition will benefit from the money set aside for the competition,” said Ndebele.
Though he could not be drawn to shed light on the format of the tournament, it is likely that the top four teams at the end of the season will be the only ones to participate in the competition. Other options will be to make it a top eight tournament.
By lifting last year’s richest football tournament in the country, Highlanders went away with $130,000 with losing finalists How Mine who they had beaten 3-0 taking home $90,000.
For winning the league title, Dynamos were paid $70,000, $60,000 less than what Bosso got for lifting the Mbada Diamonds Cup and $20, 000 short of what the losing finalists How Mine got.
How Mine also got a $110,000 subsidy from Mbada Diamonds for their Caf Confederation Cup participation.
Teams that were knocked out in the first round of the Mbada Diamonds Cup were rewarded with $15,000 each, with losing quarter-finalists receiving $30,000 each while those that were booted out in the semi-finals banked $45,000.
There were also individual prizes that saw eccentric Highlanders goalkeeper Munyaradzi Diya smiling all the way to the bank after getting a cool $1,500 for being the Player of the Tournament. He got another $1,000 for being the Goalkeeper of the Tournament after conceding four goals in the competition.
The top goalscorer accolade had a $1,000 prize money and was shared by five players who scored two goals each. Part of the million-dollar sponsorship saw Mbada Diamonds taking care of the teams’ transport, accommodation and food. The players were given $100 participation fees for every game while seven members of the technical department got $150.
The most disciplined team was rewarded with $1,000 and medals. All the teams that participated in the competition got 30 tracksuits, a similar number of warm up jerseys and 30 pairs of playing kit each.
Repeated efforts to get comment from Mbada Diamonds corporate executive George Manyaya were fruitless as his mobile phone was not reachable.
Online Reporter