Africa-Press – Lesotho. At some point we should stop pretending there is professional football in Lesotho. Say what you may but what we have is something way lower than an amateur football league. It’s an overrated boozers’ league. Sixteen teams playing every weekend doesn’t make it a professional league.
Muckraker came to this conclusion a few years ago but a recent match has reinforced her view that our league, if we are charitable enough to call it that, is an epic national embarrassment.
She had a torrid time watching the match between LCS and Sefotha-Fotha at the Ratjomose Barracks. The pitch had overgrown grass that made it difficult for players to see the ball.
Instead of playing football the players were playing hide and seek in the grass. When they eventually found each other they competed to find the ball which was always swallowed by the grass. Some of the players looked like they were wearing litopo instead of soccer boots.
The substitutes were getting scorched in the sun while the coaches would occasionally emerge from bushes to bark instructions at players who were obviously tired of disentangling themselves from the tall grass.
This, by the way, is the norm at our football matches. If the players are not playing in knee-high grass, they are doing it in storms of dust. You hit the ball and it disappears into a whirlwind.
After a few minutes in the dust, players look like they have been carrying bags of cement for weeks. Why Lefa hasn’t forced players to wear masks is mind-boggling.
Most of our football pitches are glorified potato fields. The only difference is that players are kicking stones instead of potatoes. At halftime, players are gulping water from five-litre bottles.
The least said about the so-called wages the better. As for the quality of the football, Muckraker has one word: Horrible. Players cannot stop the ball, stray passes look deliberate, the only tactic is substitution and hoofing the ball into the crowd is what they call defence.
Muckraker has nothing but praise for our football journalists who have to report the matches. They have to find some superlatives to describe these sh**t shows we call matches.
The Lesotho Times’ Leemisa Thuseho recently described a save as “superb” and opponents who were struggling to run in the grass as “absorbing pressure”.
A rising star, he will soon learn to contain his imagination. Moorosi Tsiane, one of Muckraker’s favourite sportswriters, has long stopped smearing lipstick on frogs.
He calls a goal a goal. Nothing about it being brilliant or stunning. Tlalane Phahla, a brilliant sports journalist, keeps it simple and to the point.
The Public Eye’s Nthako Majoro has stopped wasting his time reporting on the boozers’ league. Oh, there are only four sports journalists in Lesotho. Go argue with your grandmother if that gets your goat.
For More News And Analysis About Lesotho Follow Africa-Press
