First AGM for new rugby committee
Calistus Kolantsho | Friday February 24, 2017 15:36
The Dave Gilbert-led committee inherited an association crippled by various challenges such as the lack of league sponsorship, the pending construction of a rugby stadium and a doping scandal that saw two seven’s national team players suspended.
When the new committee took over, one of their primary aims was to resuscitate rugby and secure league sponsorship. At the moment, sponsorship is still elusive.
“Our attempt is to apply better management of what we have, to ensure the growth of rugby in this country. We want our players to have more game time and that has been happening since last year,” secretary general, Ernest Mantsi told Mmegi Sport yesterday.
He said the committee increased the number of league matches last season through a new structure to the league. He said the same model will be adopted this year. Mantsi said they hope by extending the season, it will assist them in netting sponsorship. He said companies like to associate with codes that are constantly active to give them continuous mileage. He said the other important aspect is to make sure that local rugby is in the spotlight for the right reasons.
“There is no company that can associate itself with us if we do not take ourselves seriously. We should focus and change the way we do things. Brand marketing is the way in this era. A strong brand makes it easy to attract sponsorship,” said Mantsi.
He said the absence of a national league sponsorship also means schools rugby and national teams are suffering the same fate.
He admitted that it is a battle that they foresee winning soon.
Mantsi said as part of empowerment, plans are in place to train coaches and managers to ensure that they are aware of their roles when it comes to player management. He also emphasised the need to get a stadium.
“We have a challenge of getting our own stadium. At the moment we have partnerships with some of our affiliates who have their own stadiums. We are doing that at a certain fee of course but in some instances they offer them to us for free,” Mantsi said.
He said the other facilities they would like to have are conference rooms to be used for rugby courses and meetings.
Meanwhile, Mantsi said the doping ban that was imposed on two players, Lesedi Cherry and Emmanuel Ntshiwa ends in November. He said this should be a lesson to other rugby players and other stakeholders.
He said doping can end a player’s career and should be avoided at all costs. Despite that, he said they always offer anti-doping lessons to avoid the reoccurrence of such incidents.