Stakeholders hail Mascom Top 8 success

FREDERICK KEBADIRETSE
Staff Writer | Wednesday August 1, 2012 00:00

 

Township Rollers beat Francistown side ECCO City Green 3-1 in Gaborone to lift the trophy and the P1 million cash prize. Mascom public relations and communications manager, Tebogo Lebotse said they were very impressed with the general organisation of the competition. She said when Mascom decided to sponsor soccer again, it was encouraged by a conviction that soccer is close to the hearts of Batswana including their 1.6 million subscribers.In November 2011, BPL and Mascom signed a two year deal worth P7 million with an option to renew for a third year.'The Mascom Top 8 has achieved the objectives we set out and it is now a brand that we are proud of.

We were impressed with the level of competitiveness and how the supporters embraced the tournament,' Lebotse said. She congratulated Rollers for becoming the first team to lift the trophy and also welcomed Mogoditshane Fighters who will be the only new side in the next top eight edition. For his part, Premier League chief executive officer (CEO), Bennet Mamelodi said despite a few hiccups they faced at the start, everything went smoothly and they were quite satisfied with the tournament.

He said it was not easy fitting the cup programme into an already congested league schedule.He said there are a number of improvements they have to make in the next edition after learning from the challenges they faced in organising the first. Mamelodi said they intend to start the next Top 8 edition early so that it can finish before the end of the league program to allow all Premier League teams to have a proper off-season. He said the format for the competition would stay the same with teams playing two legged home and away matches in the quarterfinals and semi finals.

Meanwhile the awards for the inaugural Top 8 cup are scheduled for August 30th at the GICC. Eleven categories have been named in style with the Mascom number one brand. The categories are number one yellow boot (top goal scorer), number one player (player of the tournament), number one safe hands (best goalkeeper), number one coach, number one scribe (print journalist), number one talk more (TV commentator), number one presenter (radio), number one lens (photographer), number one referee and number one assistant referee.