FRESHLY crowned league champions African Stars dominated this year’s MTC Namibia Premier League (NPL) awards held in the capital yesterday.
Following the successful defence of their league crown, ‘Stalile’ were honoured as the team of the season, and the man who guided the team to consecutive league glory, Bobby Samaria, scooped the coach of the year award for the second year running. The diminutive method man is on the verge of securing the Leo NFA Cup which would round of a memorable season for his side on Saturday. After pipping teammate Rudi Louw and Tigers’ Tangeni Shipahu, African Stars goal minder Maximilian Mbaeva became the first goalkeeper to win the premiership’s Player of Season award. He deposed last year’s winner Jerome Louis, who was the league’s top scorer for the second season in a row with 18 goals. Mbaeva conceded just 13 goals in 22 games and kept ten clean sheets in the process.He received a cool N$15 000 for his solid showing in the 2009/10 campaign; Louis got N$10 000 for his goals and Samaria pocketed the same amount for his winning tactics.Domestic football’s main security man, Laurentius Humphiries of Humphries Security Guard Division, and African Stars team manager Lesley Kozonguizi received the Chairperson’s Award. The award is given to an individual who the NPL’s chairman, Johnny Doëseb, deems to have contributed most to the domestic game during the season.The league’s supremo said he was determined to see the amateur football establishment move towards a professional status. He also highlighted some of the achievements made by his administration during the 2009/10 season, including the appointment of Mathew Haikali as CEO, clubs setting up offices, and registering the NPL as a company.’We want to show our sponsors our achievements during the past season,’ said Doëseb. ‘Come 2010/11 I want the NPL to become an institution that is moving towards a professional set-up. ‘The commercial interests of the league must come before personal gains. By 2010/11 all teams in the premier league should be registered companies.’I have to applaud African Stars for the efforts. They have proactively promoted their team to their supporters.’ Director of Sport Vetumbuavi Veii commended Doëseb’s endeavours and called on all clubs to bring their part in order for the league to realise its desired objective. He urged football clubs to source alternative and supplementary funding elsewhere. ‘The league administrators are doing all they can to professionalise the game of football in Namibia,’ said Veii.’I’m inclined to think that some of these teams solely rely on monies from the league sponsor and do nothing on their own to sustain their clubs. ‘It is about time that our clubs start raising funds and depend less on what we have come to know as start-up capital or grants.’African Stars chairman Sydney Martin said his club is researching the possibility of campaigning in the continental Confederation of African Football (CAF) Champions League. He added that funding was not the only constraint to competing in Africa.’African Stars will try their level best to participate in the champions league next year,’ Martin said.’There are many other logistics involved when you take part in such a competition and these must be addressed before we can take part.’
