Excellent suggestion by Nyamilandu to reduce teams in Super League

In his manifesto ahead of the elective general assembly on December 16 at which incumbent Football Association of Malawi (FAM) president, Walter Nyamilandu is seeking to be re-elected, he indicates that the Super League shall be reduced to 12 teams from the current 16 in line with FIFA requirements as well as cutting on costs and enhancing competition.

I totally agree with this — it’s a move in the right direction if our football is to improve bearing in mind that teams crisscross the country week in and week out; spending so much resources but the return from such investment is very little to uplift the teams for the next season.

To do this, we need to boost the image of the lower leagues in all three regions — the Premier Division and Division 1 by providing them with heavy sponsorship and erecting right stadia from which they generate money from tickets.

Imagine, people watch these lower leagues for free! No! This shouldn’t be allowed and thus, I say, pump in enough resources to empower these lower leagues with the right infrastructure such as we have in Mulanje, Balaka, Dedza, Karonga and the yet to be completed in Zomba.

If the lower leagues are correctly assembled, say 12 each for Super League, Premier Division and Division 1, they shall be very competitive in such a way that earning promotion into the elite league shall be a huge achievement.

The reserve sides of the Super League should also have their own youth league — not the current system where they compete with older players in the Premier Division or Division 1. They need to be assessed for promotion into the main team based on their performance against their age group competitors.

We can’t have four competitions targeting the elite league alone — starting with the year-long Super League itself, the Airtel Top 8, the FDH Bank Cup and the Castel Challenge, that was introduced out of nowhere when the season was underway.

Spread them out to the lower leagues. Let the Super League teams compete for their league title, the Airtel Top 8 and FDH Bank Cup as the the national cup competition and the Castel Challenge for the Premier Divisions — formatted like the Airtel Top 8.

Secure strong sponsorship for the Division 1 by also giving the teams subventions for their travel costs to create great competition amongst them to earn promotion to the upper stage where the bigger money is rolling.

Nyasa Big Bullets coach, Kalisto Pasuwa has been complaining that his charges were fatigued having had to endure congested fixtures in the past four months — saying on top of the TNM Super League assignments, they had to honour four tough Confederation of Africa Football (CAF) Champions League international matches — two being two legs against one of Africa’s top sides, TP Mazembe.

In between they had to defend the FDH Bank Cup which they retained and went on to retain the TNM Super League 2023 title and are through to the Castel Challenge Cup quarterfinals after beating Civil Service United 3-0 on Saturday at the Kamuzu Stadium.

The tight fixtures continue as they next meet Ekwendeni Hammers in the Castel Challenge Cup quarterfinal on Wednesday this week and they are also in the final of the Airtel Top 9 — waiting for the outcome of the appeal on disciplinary determination which Mighty Wanderers are contesting.

Out of all expenses spent to prepare and honour the FDH Bank Cup fixtures, they earned K40 million as prize money, of which a big chunk has to go to the players and officials themselves and I don’t think there was any surplus into the team’s coffers to be used for defence expenses next season.

We can’t allow ourselves to have people watch for free games Premier Division and Division 1 games. The same should apply in which people — many of them who have lots of money — watch elite team matches for free as what is provided for as complementary tickets.

Who pays for these complementary tickets and who, for heaven’s sake, came up with this system? It’s a rotten system. If people want to watch matches at the VIP Stand, they should pay for it — even the Head of State and his whole entourage of Cabinet Ministers that follow him; such as what happens when he travels outside the country and on his return.

People shouldn’t be allowed to steal money from ticket sales at the gates. Ban entry tickets at the gates in that the advance payment should be inculcated so that every tambala should find the main money making beneficiary — the man on the pitch.

Advance ticket sales should be kept open until midday of the Match Day so that a fan can buy theirs and be able to dash to the match venue.

Nyamilandu also pledged to secure K300 million league or cup sponsorship by 2027 in which the championship will pocket K100 million, runners-up will receive K75 million, third-positioned K50 million and fourth-placed K25 million.

He also promised that in the promotion of rural football, he will increase  sponsorship of the FAM District Cup and the Moto Division One League from K2 million to K5 million per district and K25 million to K50 million per region respectively by 2027.

That sponsorship is for today, bwana, not 2027 because by that time, with the unpredictable trends of inflation and other economic shocks, it will be very little.

Otherwise, I welcome Nyamilandu’s suggestion to reduce the number of Super League teams to 12 and should he lose, I ask his competitor Fleetwood Haiya to take this up because it is an excellent idea.

Haiya shouldn’t throw away some of the ideas in Nyamilandu’s manifesto and if the incumbent loses, he should share where he intends to secure the sponsorship package he intends to execute — if the man who has been at the helm of football administration for 19 years has the passion for the development of the beautiful game.

Let the best mind win on December 16, not zomati wakhalitsa (he has overstayed) as the reason for Nyamilandu to be ousted as used by a large section of the football fraternity — that reason smacks of downright jealousy and envy.