01 Mar 2023

Sunday soccer has become the biggest competitor to Botswana Football League (BFL) and other leagues in Africa.

Speaking at a press conference in Gaborone on Tuesday, BFL new chief executive officer, Senzo Mbatha, said he spent more than two years in Tanzania where he saw the growth of Sunday soccer.

Mbatha said professional leagues were were competing with Sunday soccer.

“It now talks to us as a professional wing to say how we look at our licensing and regulations. 

Do we really have to say the teams must build the stadiums,” he said.

Mbatha said it was now of paramount importance that teams should comply with having a pitch, fence, maybe two stands and let people come and watch football in numbers.

He said there was need to find balance particularly that BFL existed in community of football. 

He further noted that when drawing their fixtures, there were certain things that should be considered.

“For example, we have to plan our day. There is an EPL game at 1 o’clock and we squeeze our match at 4 pm instead of 3 o’clock.

We cannot run away from the fact that they talk of the second screen, while they are watching a game at the stadium, they are busy watching another game on the social media,” he said.

The other important aspect, Mbatha said, was the competitiveness of the league, adding it called for well managed offices for the club.

For his part, Botswana Football Association (BFA) chief executive officer, Mfolo Mfolo, said UEFA assist project was running well in Zambia, adding that they had agreed with UEFA that it should provide training to Botswana to build BFL.

“We have agreed with UEFA that we would have a six months training for this project, which has four pillars,” he said.

The pillars are governance and administration, league development, club development as well as  marketing and sponsorship.

Mfolo said the pillar of marketing and sponsorship was a key performance indicator that must ensure the league generated P22 million in a year.

Talking about the newly appointed CEO, BFL board chairperson Nicholas Zakhem said they wanted someone who was conversant with football and commercialisation.

Mbatha is the former CEO of Yanga and Simba Sports Clubs in Tanzania and was also an administrative manager at Orlando Pirates, Platinum Stars, Bay United and general manager at University of Pretoria. ENDs