Big shake-up for football

MASERU – The Lesotho Football Association (LEFA) says it plans to repackage local competitions in a bid to jazz up the country’s football.

LEFA says it is going to present cups in a different format because it can help to attract sponsors from the corporate world and the football fraternity.

The new strategy was revealed by the association’s secretary general, Mokhosi Mohapi at a Strategic Framework Session held on Friday at the association’s headquarters, Bambatha Tšita Sports Arena.

The repackaging is one of many goals the country’s football governing body is set to embark on in hopes to improve the local game.

In his presentation, Mohapi said the goal is to transform the current status of the local league and have competitive representatives in CAF club competitions.

Mohapi said LEFA also aims to improve the financial stability of clubs.

“The first objective will be to improve the organisational functionality at management level and have productive responsible football clubs,” Mohapi said.

“(We need to address) our visitors in club management because we have studied and we have seen that, at club level, they are visitors, they use it for other reasons not to make football a viable industry on its own,” he said.

“Football management should be in (a) cordial environment with the mother body (LEFA), the relationship can be much better and, if it is, we will be able to leave each other’s spaces and all be successful. If the national team needs help, it will be helped, and our teams will understand the bigger picture because at the current rate we are having about 90 percent coming from the league,” he continued.

The association is set to clamp down on the number of foreigners that are eligible to start a match in the Vodacom Premier League in order to increase more slots for Basotho. Currently, each top-flight team is allowed to register five foreign players.

Over 50 foreigners play each weekend and occupy key positions that Likuena could benefit from if Basotho were playing instead, LEFA argues.

Mohapi said while the federation does not want to discriminate against foreign players, the influx of foreign players becomes a problem for the national team, Likuena.

“The problem is that the most key positions in the league that can represent Likuena are played by foreigners. Go to big teams – Bantu, Linare, Matlama – if we say: ‘let’s try to replace (Lesotho captain) Basia (Makepe) as a centreback’, whom can we replace him with, because the centrebacks are foreigners. If we try to find a replacement for (Motebang Sera) at centre-forward, (the strikers at big clubs) are foreigners,” he said.

“I am proposing we reduce it to three (foreign players) that start a match. We cannot discriminate against foreigners because they are coming to help us, but we are realising that we are not performing well with the national team, (so) let’s increase the slots for Basotho,” he continued.

LEFA’s eye is not just on the players, the federation has also closed the door on foreign coaches who come to Lesotho to earn the CAF A Licence, only for them to leave. The A Licence is the second highest coaching qualification offered by CAF and it is a must-have requirement for a coach to sit on the bench during CAF competitions.

It is cheaper to acquire the licence in Lesotho as it is heavily subsidised by LEFA. In other countries it is difficult to get a CAF A Licence because it is expensive and can cost upwards of M80 000.

In Lesotho it costs a mere M2 500 and few foreigners have benefited from that generosity, but the association has now closed the tap.

“The (LEFA technical director Lehlohonolo Thotanyana) has agreed that from now on we are not allowing foreigners unless they are nominated by their countries to be part of our coaching courses because after they acquire their licence they leave, we take even assistant coaches we make them A Licence coaches and they leave,” Mohapi said.

LEFA president Advocate Salemane Phafane added that the quota of youth players has to increase as part of the repackaging of local competitions

Phafane said the majority of players in the A Division should be Under-20 players. Currently, in the A Division the youth quota is two players.

“We have to increase the youth quota; in this day and age can we really be proud that a 35-year-old man is playing for a C Division team? It should be young kids of 17-years (playing). When you go to A Division, 90 percent is U20. I think next season it’s going to increase,” Phafane said.

“We will only be developing if a minimum of five are players are Under-20,” the LEFA president added.

“We are not going to develop if we continue using old players and yet when it comes to the national team people start saying coaches are playing old players, where will they get the young ones when we play old players in the league?”

Tlalane Phahla