The neutrals will feel cheated by circumstances beyond their control. It was an unfair, tough examination. The football gods dictated that only one of Angels or Chiefs will join the Premier League assembly next season.
It was a cruel way to pick one over the other when the overwhelming choice for the football neutrals would have been both teams gaining promotion to the Premier League.
It was a difficult multiple choice question without the option of ‘All of the above’. It had to be one. For the obvious reasons, the Premier League is yearning for the Chiefs swagger; the choral influence on the stands, the pulling power and everything good about the Kgatleng side. Equally, the Premier League is so cold without a Francistown team.
The second city has been without a team in the top league since the relegation of TAFIC at the controversial end of the 2020 season. Francistown has been probably the only second city in the entire southern African region, if not in Africa and beyond, that did not have a team in the Premier League. So the promotion of Angels was equally paramount.
At the start of the promotion play-off, Angels were regarded as the sacrificial lamb meekly led to the slaughter. But they sent warning signs in the first leg, which Chiefs refused to heed.
Those who were part of the crowd at the River Plate Stadium in Mochudi left the ground purring. Purring not about the hosts, but about the little known side from Francistown guided by one of the youngest coaches in Botswana, Seemo Mpatane. Chiefs thought they would recover since there was no physical damage inflicted in the first leg. But the Chiefs players and fans suffered some deep wounds in Francistown as skirmishes broke out on the stands and a brutal lesson was dished on the pitch.
The Chiefs fans felt it was a diabolic display by the Francistown side, but for the hosts, it was angelic. Chiefs had never been past the Dibete cordon fence for a league match since their relegation from the Premier League in 2017.
The weekend trip proved to be the longest in whatever way you look at it. It’s a sad reminder that while Chiefs could literally touch the Premier League not too long ago, there were still hundreds of kilometres to go; nearly 900km to be exact. It is unimaginable that the Chiefs fans will still be stomping the dusty grounds in song next season, when it looked like they would exchange the standing arrangements for the bucket seats at the National Stadium, the Obed Itani Chilume and many other far more comfortable facilities.
It is a pity that for a brand as appealing as Chiefs, their name will be again missing when the top 16 sides in the country are mentioned. Putting so much effort and emerging with nothing could have devastating outcomes, with the mental state key as they go again in their quest to return to the elite league.
Meanwhile, it is disheartening that football authorities are stubborn and don’t want to learn. Before the ink could dry on the Royal Aria report, there were ugly scenes at the Francistown Stadium, something that could have been avoided with proper planning.
