adminRay Bande Senior Sports Reporter
MUTARE Premiership side Buffaloes will play their home match against Triangle at Vengere in Rusape tomorrow (Saturday) after the Premier Soccer League remained adamant that their home Sakubva is unfit to host top-flight league matches. However, the decision by the Premier Soccer League management to ban Sakubva from hosting Premiership matches has not gone down well with the Mutare outfit, which believes that even though their home ground is not in a good state, it is, however, not worse than other venues that have been given the greenlight to host top-flight league matches.
What perturbed the Buffaloes faithful the most is that the Grounds Inspection Committee had pledged to return to Mutare for the final inspection, but failed to do so and only went ahead to order the Mutare side to host Triangle at Vengere.
New Buffaloes’ spokesperson Gladman Chimonyo said his team was bitter that the PSL had found it prudent to ban Sakubva, yet there are other match venues that were approved when they are virtually the same, if not worse, than Sakubva.
“It is a sad development that the PSL has found it prudent to ban Sakubva Stadium, yet there are other match venues that were approved when they are almost the same if not worse than our home ground.
“We are an affiliate of the PSL and we will abide by their demands, but in this case we will do so with a heavy heart. After all, they had initially promised us that they would be coming here this week for the final inspection, but to our surprise they have just decided to have us play against Triangle at Vengere when we had played our part in pushing for speedy renovations of the stadium,” he said.
Last week the Premier Soccer League grounds committee, headed by the league chairman Twine Phiri, came to Mutare to inspect Sakubva and deemed it unfit to host Premiership matches and indicated that they would return to see improvements done on the facility on Wednesday this week.
The Mutare City Council in conjunction with Buffaloes joined hands to fast-track the renovations, but the grounds committee failed to turn up for inspection as pledged and instead indicated that they would only do so next Friday.
The issue about Sakubva has been making headlines in the mainstream media as well as social media platforms, let alone in meeting places in the eastern border city.
When contacted for comment, PSL head of secretariat Kenny Ndebele professed ignorance about all the developments regarding the issue.
“I do not know anything about it. Talk to the people who gave you the fixtures and you can get a comment. I was not around and I have just arrived,” said Ndebele on Wednesday afternoon in a telephone interview.
However, when he came to Mutare to inspect Sakubva, Phiri told this newspaper that they had engaged the Buffaloes leadership on the issue and got assurance that thorough renovations would be done inside a week.
“Nothing has been done on improving Sakubva Stadium, to be honest. Our concerns have not been addressed at all.
“We advised them to revamp their changing rooms, work on the turf and also change the goalposts because those made of steel are no longer wanted.
“We have also recommended the renovation of the changing rooms. They are in a bad state. We sincerely hope that the work will be done effectively because we have also engaged the Buffaloes president, who is the commander at 3 Brigade and he also gave us his word that the stadium will be renovated to meet the minimum required standards before we return for our final inspection,” said Phiri.
However, Phiri and his entourage did not return for the so-called final inspection.
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