Black
Leopards is the only pride of the Limpopo Province competing in the elite. However,
all is not well in the Lidoda Duvha family. They last won a soccer match on the
November 24, 2012 against University Of Pretoria but since then, they haven’t
won single game in the past 6 fixtures.
In
the last 6 games, they only managed to collect 2 points despite having depth of
quality and experienced players. Now they are a point ahead of the bottom teams
AmaZulu FC, Chippa United and Ajax Cape Town. Currently Black Leopards is at
the relegation zone and any win by bottom three will relegate Black Leopards to
the bottom of the log.
Two Problems with
Black Leopards
1. The coaching
instability
The
team is known for been exasperated with any coach who doesn’t deliver positive
results within agreed mandate. Many Black Leopards fans believed that Ian
Palmer will turn the table around after Sunday Chidzwambwa was elevated to the
Technical Director post but Ian was released from the duty after few games and
now they appointed unacquainted caretaker coach Abel Makhubele without any Premier Soccer League coaching experience at the critical phase of the league.
Abel
has been a development coach for many years and assistant coach for some few
years at Leopards but to be honest, he is not yet ready to coach a Premier Soccer
League team despite his wealth of soccer knowledge imparted through attending
coaching courses in Germany and other European countries. He already lost 2
clear games where Black Leopards was outclassed and outplayed against Wits
University and bottom of the log by then Chippas United.
Abel
Makhubele days are numbered as caretaker coach as they will either demote him
or released him if failed to get good results against hot to handle Kaizer
Chiefs as the team will be in serious trouble of relegation. Going forward,
Black Leopards should hire serious coach with Premier Soccer League experience.
They
need experience coach of Owen Da Gama calibre to rescue them from relegation
but if I was a Chairman of the team, I will appoint current Dynamos of Zimbabwe
coach Callisto Pasuwa with championship winning mentality. Callisto Pasuwa and
Sunday Chidzwamba will form a lethal technical team combination.
2. Peter Mokaba
Stadium
Peter
Mokaba stadium is like an away home for Black Leopards. The team doesn’t have
support in that stadium and they are also not doing well there. Leopards played
9 games at Polokwane stadium and managed to collect 7 points and managed to
collect 10 points away from home. They are fairly a good traveller which
justified that all is not well at Peter Mokaba Stadium despite playing at the
best pitch in South Africa.
Thohoyandou
stadium used to be a slaughter house with minimum of 17 000 fans in each and
every Black Leopards home games and even the famous slaughter house
Tshifulanani Stadium used to have minimum of 3000 which is far much better than
almost empty Peter Mokaba stadium. Unfortunately, Thohoyandou stadium revamping
process is taking longer to be completed as many communicated dates for
completion have elapsed whilst Tshifulanani Stadium is failing to meet all the
necessary requirements for Premier Soccer League games.
What
else Black Leopards should do to avoid imminent relegation?
By Owen Mundalamo
