‘WE HAD NO CHOICE’
Jere opens up PSL’s abrupt break
Clarifies temporary closure of NSS
THE Premier Soccer League have come under fierce attack for abruptly halting their championship programme this week.
A number of the game’s leading voices have slammed the PSL for freezing the entire programme after the Sports Commission advised them that the National Sports Stadium would now be undergoing major maintenance work.
The debate has centred around why the PSL didn’t take the matches, which had been booked for the giant stadium, to other centres like Baobab, Gibbo and Mandava.
Yesterday, PSL chairman, Farai Jere, told H-Metro it would have been impossible to take these matches, set for the giant stadium, elsewhere without triggering a logistical nightmare.
He said it was important to also reveal that the advice from the SRC was not that the giant stadium had been closed for all matches but that it would be open for a limited number of games but, crucially, without fans, for the duration of the maintenance.
The SRC advise, which came from their director of finance, human resources and administration, Brian Hodza, read:
“The Sports and Recreation Commission (SRC) would like to advise the Premier Soccer League (PSL), that the stadium is currently undergoing major maintenance works on water reticulation.
“Therefore, spectators will not be allowed into the facility until further notice.
“On a separate, but related matter, SRC shall, with immediate effect, be limiting the number of matches on the main arena to two (2) per week to allow the playing field to regenerate.”
Jere said the PSL could have chosen to go ahead with a limited programme of matches at the giant stadium but, without fans, it would not have made sense.
“We have been fighting to get fans back to the stadium and the advice from the SRC was clear that fans would not be allowed during the maintenance period, maybe because of the water issues,” said Jere.
“Now, faced with this scenario, we could have said okay, let the games be played there without fans and the same people, who are criticising us for suspending the league, would have been the first to criticise us for turning our backs on the fans.
“Some people forget that, until the advice from the SRC, we had already sent in the fixtures, for this weekend, which tells you that we wanted matches to be played.
“When circumstances changed, we took a decision, as the leaders, to suspend the league because we felt it was in the best interest of the league, our sponsors and, most importantly, our fans, who would have been left out of the action if matches went ahead at the National Sports Stadium.
“It was just not logistically possible to distribute the matches, which have been penciled for the National Sports Stadium, to other venues, as some are saying, because you just don’t tell Highlanders on Wednesday that you are no longer going to play in Harare but in the Lowveld, especially when there are matches already set for Gibbo.”
-HMetro-
