Moorosi Tsiane
THE Bantu defending duo of Tsietsi Khooa and Bokang Sello has travelled to Port Elizabeth where they are expected to join Premier Soccer League side Chippa United.
The duo left on Sunday and will be re-uniting with their former teammate Maloisane Ramasimong, who left Bantu two seasons ago to join Bloemfontein Celtic. He left the Bloemfontein outfit at the end of the 2019/20 season to join Chippa.
The news of this duo joining Chippa left many football enthusiasts elated. If they successfully move to Chippa, that will bring the number of South Africa based players to seven.
Tumelo Khutlang left Lioli two years ago to Join Black Leopards. He was followed by Mkhwanazi Motlomelo and Motebang Sera who left Bantu and Matlama to join Celtic and TTM a year later.
Nkoto Masoabi also left the country two years back to join GladAfrica Championship side real Kings.
While things didn’t really work out for Mkhwanazi, who returned six months into his contract and Masoabi spent most of his time watching from the sidelines until he was released in January, I think the increase in the number of players Lesotho has exported to South African leagues is promising.
Lesotho has been struggling to export players to neighbouring countries for a long time and now that seven players have moved to South Africa in three years shows that we could be on the right track.
This will eventually improve our national team as more of our players will be plying their trade in better leagues.
Before I bow out, I must make a special request to Gender and Youth, Sport and Recreation minister Likeli Tampane and Lesotho Football Association (LeFA) secretary general Mokhosi Mohapi to stop their bickering.
Mohapi says he has tabled his proposal to the ministry for the resumption of soccer activities to the ministry but on the other hand, Tampane has been in the media claiming not to have seen LeFA’s proposal.
LeFA is racing against time in their bid to see that football is allowed to return, six months after it was halted because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Now LeFA must ensure that soccer activities are allowed in time for the senior national soccer team to fulfill its AFCON assignments in November.
It is clear that there is a problem between Mohapi and Tampane but the bottom line is that they must work together if there is to be any discernible progress. If the situation does not change, then we will continue going in circles much to the embarrassment of our footballers and other athletes who compete in different competitions with inadequate preparations because of the bungling of officials.
