Premier
Soccer League (PSL) awards will never cease to amaze me. They are meant to
compensate and console runner up team. Last year, Thulani Serero won all the
awards from the PSL runner up team Ajax Cape Town ahead of treble champions
Orlando Pirates players and now the same trend replicated itself when Siyabonga
Nomvete from PSL runner up Moroka Swallows won 3 Absa PSL 2011/2012 trophies
ahead of back-to-back PSL champion Orlando Pirates.
I
strongly believe that the judges who select the winner are not adhering to
criteria set for winning the award especial in the PSL Football of the Year
award. The criteria are explicitly articulated and well defined but the winner
of the award is always not complying with the criteria.
The
criteria include cups games and league games. Congratulations to Siyabonga
Nomvete. He stood the head and shoulders above the rest. It’s an international
trend that defenders don't get recognition for winning individual brilliance
awards. It’s unfair to defenders and PSL next year should have Defender of the Year
award to award the deserving defender.
However,
the other problem that we are having with this Football of the Year award it’s
an emotional Kaizer Chiefs supporters raving and raging at Orlando Pirates
supporters because of pure Jealousy of back to back Orlando Pirates Treble
success. They are controlled by angers, emotions and hate speech but we will
respect their views despite their negative energy or lack of substantiated
facts couple with empirical evidence.
The
PSL Football of the Year award is the consolidation of the cups and league game
excellent individual performance as the main criteria. The player who wins this
cup should be the one who stood the head and shoulders above the rest. League performance
is not good enough for a player to win this most prestigious PSL award and even
Bafana Bafana performance can be taken into consideration.
Siyabonga
Sangweni played 39 games for Pirates and managed to score 7 vital goals. He was
the spine of Orlando Pirates when they defend MTN 8 and also winning Telkom Cup
for the first time by Orlando Pirates. Siyabonga Sangweni also plays with
distinction for Bafana Bafana. He also scored crucial goals during league and
cup games. He was also a contender for the Telkom Cup players of the season. He
won 3 trophies with Orlando Pirates this season.
Nomvete
was simple the best for swallows scoring 20 league goals but he never featured
in the MTN 8 as Swallows finished outside Top 8. His team was knocked out by
Orlando Pirates in the last 8 of Telkom Cup which Orlando Pirates won the cup
with Sangweni scoring crucial goals whilst defending like a warrior and last
Swallows also didn't do well in the Nedbank Cup. Nomvete wasn't even part of
the Bafana team. He deserved the player player's of the year award, PSL player
of the year award and Lesley Manyathela Golden Boot but according to criteria
for PSL Football of the Year, Nomvete failed to fulfilled the criteria and
Siyabonga Sangweni fulfilled all the criterias for the award.
Be
the judge who deserves the award…
Challenges with the Award
1.
The PSL Football of the year award is controversial as the winners don't comply
to requirement set for selection. It is a meaningless award meant to compensate
and console the runner up team player.
2.
It is not a rocket scientist that 16 coaches selecting the best player will be
subjective against some certain team. They will never vote for a championship
player because of angers and jealousy. We have seen Gavin Hunt rant directed
towards Benni McCarthy as a result of bitterness and jealousy of McCarthy
success and also the duo Erick Tinkler and Roger de Sa chirping at McCarthy for
no apparent reason (s). The fact is PSL coaches hate Orlando Pirates for
winning almost all the trophies under their noses and such hatred was justified
during PSL Football of the year award.
3.
16 PSL coaches always deviated from the set rules of criterias and select
players based on their hearts than adhering to the criteria
4.
This meaningless PSL Football of the Year Award should be scrapped and replace
with the PSL defender of the season and PSL most creative player to honour the
defenders and midfielders as we already have best striker via Lesley Manyathela
golden boot and also the goalkeeper of the season.
Premier
Soccer League Football of the Year award is an emotional but controversial
award.
By Owen Mundalamo
Founder: Football
food for Thought Initiative
