adminRay Bande Senior Sports Reporter
PREMIER Soccer League officials were in Mutare on Tuesday morning to inspect the state of Sakubva stadium ahead of the start of the domestic Premiership season.
Although they could not divulge their findings to the media soon after inspection, the league authorities are expected to give match venue a nod to host top flight league matches given the local authority’s commendable efforts to renovate the stadium.
“We are here on a mission to inspect Sakubva stadium just like any other match venue that will host Premiership football. We are going to forward our recommendations to the powers that be. At the moment we are not allowed to give comments to the Press,” said PSL Games and Competitions manager Elisha Mandireva in a brief interview soon after the inspection process at Sakubva.
However, Mutare City Council have done a commendable job in renovating the stadium and on Wednesday municipal grounds staff were at Sakubva stadium in their numbers working on the turf and the stadium surroundings.
For the first time since the construction of the stadium, aluminium goal posts will be erected as opposed to the risky steel goal posts that have been there for years.
Mutare City Rovers chairman Isdore Bingura expressed optimism that the stadium would be ready in time for the first match against Ngezi Platinum in a fortnight.
“We are quite confident that we will be able to play our first match here at home after the renovations have been completed. As you saw, we have been playing all our friendly matches so far away from home just to pave way for these renovations. I sincerely believe that the PSL will give us the green-light to use this facility. I actually pointed it out to them during the meeting we had in Harare that we do not have an alternative venue. The only match venue we have as a club is Sakubva stadium,” said Bingura.
A number of clubs that have been using Sakubva stadium in past had problems after the league authorities refused to sanction the match venue citing the local authorities’ reluctance to refurbish the facility.
However, it appears to be a different scenario this year with the local authority going out of its way to ensure that the stadium get the approval of the Premier Soccer League.
Given that PSL has approved some facilities that are worse off than Sakubva in the past under the pretext that the local authorities in those areas have shown the zeal to improve the stadia, Sakubva stadium is likely going to be approved without any hassles as Mutare City Council has shown determination to improve the state of the match venue.
Online Reporter