Gale Ngakane
11 November 2009
Visiting clubs have always accused soccer referees of making home-side decisions during matches in Francistown.
Last weekend, the accusations nearly led to violence in the be MOBILE Premier League game between BDF XI and hosts ECCO City Greens. Annoyed by what he thought was a biased decision, the usually calm BDF XI coach, Stanley Mwaanga threatened to rough-up referee Joshua Bondo. The coach had to be restrained by members of his technical bench as he went for Bondo during half-time. Mwaanga was irked by the red card given to BDF XI skipper, Mompati 'Apache' Thuma for bouncing the ball in protest after Bondo had yellow carded a teammate. As the players and match officials walked to the change-rooms at half-time, Mwaanga suddenly lunged at Bondo. But disaster was averted by quick intervention from other BDF XI officials.
Perhaps what added salt to injury was the fact that immediately after Thuma's sending off, ECCO equalised through Robert Tamba in injury time. BDF XI had scored in the 45th minute through Mokgathi 'Pro' Mokgathi.
After the game, both Mwaanga and members of his technical bench expressed their anger saying they had tried their best to show restraint and discipline though Bondo robbed them in broad daylight. "Those referees were useless," Mwaanga said in disgust. One of his assistants said that ECCO scored from an offside position, but the assistant referee never raised the flag.
"You have to know that one of these assistant referees was officiating in a preceding First Division game (between TASC and Mahalapye Hotspurs). I think he must have been tired but he was still used in this game," said a member of Mwaanga's technical team.
However ECCO team manager, Bongani Thomola shrugged off the accusations levelled against the referees. He said ECCO played a good game and that the boys did not give up even when they were down. "To have come from a 3-0 loss (when they beaten by Township Rollers the previous weekend), to winning 2-1 is something," said Thomola.
In another Premier League game in Francistown on Sunday, visiting Nico supporters complained that the referee favoured home-side TAFIC to win 1-0. One of the incidents that made the Nico supporters see red occurred when Kitso 'Skizo' Kowa dispossessed a TAFIC attacker in what appeared to be an innocuous challenge but the referee, Meshack Medupi spotted an infringement. After the game, Nico coach, Peter Muchina was cautious in his comments about the incidents saying he does not want to give excuses after losing. "We did not play well. It was not our day today," he said.
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