AfricaPress-Tanzania: THE Tanzania Premier League Board (TPLB) has expressed its satisfaction on renovated venues that will host matches.
About five venues were temporarily suspended from hosting Premier League matches this season until they were renovated to meet a required standard.
The TPLB has also reminded all teams featuring in the top flight league to have different venues purposely for their respective team trainings and league matches.
This will enable the venues set for the league matches being usable at any time rather than being used also for training purposes.
TPLB Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Almas Kasongo said they have now seen the positive effects resulted to the banning of ‘ungraded’ venues after the responsible authorities taking actions.
“For instance, the Gwambina Complex, Jamhuri Stadium in Morogoro and Karume Stadium in Mara have now attained the required status as proposed by the league board,” he said.
“As the board, we came up with the strict measures to start suspending all the venues whose pitches were not in a good standard and now, we are happy to see the desirable works which have been done since their closure,” said Kasongo.
“This is in accordance with our requirement of seeing our clubs having two different grounds, one to be used for the games and the other for training purposes, that is why we take it very seriously,” he noted.
He added: “We have realised that some teams are not adhering to this as such, noting that they will not be sidelined from facing penalties which are imposed on the club that go against the available regulation. “Our board will still continue to monitor and suspend any venue whose condition is not impressive to embrace Premier League matches and I am sure that it is possible for us to have convenient infrastructures for the leisure of the players and spectators.”
He also seized the opportunity to laud media outlets for their good works to create awareness to people on the importance of upgrading pitches, a thing he said has reached across the country and attracted attention from many stakeholders.
“The most important issue here is for everyone to take a leading role in ensuring that league venues are of good status at all time without waiting for the TPLB to suspend them,” insisted Kasongo.
So far, three venues which were earlier suspended from entertaining games like Gwambina Complex, Karume Stadium in Mara and Jamhuri Stadium in Morogoro have seen their bans lifted and are now eligible to stage matches.
He said Ushirika Stadium, which is located in Kilimanjaro region is yet to be given the green light of hosting league matches until it meets the set conditions.
