Chris Theko
Prominent local commercial bank, Nedbank Lesotho was revealed as the main sponsor for the A-Division Top 8 tournament with an investment of M250 000 into the competition this year.
The announcement was made during a media briefing that took place at the Lesotho Football Association (LeFA) headquarters in Maseru this week by the A-Division Management Committee (ADMACO).
It was previously announced during a draw of the competition by that ADMACO that discussions were ongoing with the sponsor on whether they would be on board. And the tournament was to be enrolled by LeFA in the anticipated absence of a sponsor.
Nedbank came into the picture as a sponsor in 2019 where it was announced they would partner with the A-Division for three years thereby injecting M250 000 annually into the competition.
Winners of the tournament will this year pocket M25 000 while runners-up will get M20 000. In the same way, the winners of the Nedbank Championship (Champ of Champs) will take home M20 000 while the runners-up will get M15 000.
The draw was conducted a fortnight ago and had scheduled some of the mouthwatering clashes with the A-Division Southern Stream champions, Machokha set to take on Litšito from the Northern Stream while the Northern Stream Champions Galaxy were drawn against Naughty Boys.
ACE Maseru will lock horns with Lilemela with Qacha’s Nek LMPS set to take on Limkokwing University.
The tournament’s quarter finals were initially scheduled to be played on April 30, 2022 and the final set for 1 May 2022.
However, with the return of Nedbank as a sponsor a rescheduling of the fixtures had to be conducted to accommodate for the tournament’s jerseys to be organized.
ADMACO Chairman TÅ¡eliso Ramatla expressed his gratitude to Nedbank Lesotho while welcoming the bank once more into the football fraternity.
“As ADMCO we realized that time was not on our side as far as organizing for the tournament while our engagements with the sponsor were ongoing and we had asked LeFA to assist us to continue with the tournament because teams were ready but would need to know the dates hence we conducted the draw,†he said.
Speaking at the same event, Nedbank Lesotho Marketing Manager Sekonyela Matamane said as a bank, they are proud to be part of the football fraternity and are appreciative of the opportunity to be part of the tournament.
“We had lengthy discussions with ADMACO and are grateful for their understanding because we all know that in 2020 things sort of took a turn for the worse due to Covid-19 which threatened our livelihoods as well as business and put sports on hold.
“Despite the challenges I have mentioned brought by Covid-19, we had to go back to review our commitment as a bank to be able to continue and so we are happy that we could have the capacity to put back the tournament where it was in 2019 when we came in,†Matamane said.
Following the tournament’s conclusion, the Champion of Champions (Champ of Champs) game will take place between Machokha and Galaxy on May 15, 2022.
All the games are scheduled to be played at the Bambatha TÅ¡ita Sports grounds in Maseru.
