Chippa United head into a brand new Betway Premiership season with much public uncertainty as to what the makeup of their squad is.
SA’s premier league kicks off on Saturday and fans are excited for the return of their favourite teams.
Chippa United have a high-profile start to their campaign on Saturday (3pm), when they face defending champions Mamelodi Sundowns, who are riding high after dispatching Richards Bay in the MTN8 quarterfinals.
A large crowd in excess of 20,000 is expected to attend.
But until late Tuesday morning, their fans had no idea who the new personnel in the team would be to face the Brazilians.
The club released a huge contingent of 18 players in June and has presumably bolstered its ranks with several new signings.
Some of them were drip-fed on social media through Tuesday afternoon but generally a veil of secrecy appears to have been drawn over the Chippa United camp.
There appeared to be much confusion about the staging of a local media conference ahead of the Sundowns game.
The club told The Herald last week there would be a media day this week. On Monday, it reversed that, saying there would not be a presser.
Then on Tuesday evening, the club sent out an invitation to local media inviting them to a media conference at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium on Thursday morning.
The invite said the club’s chair, Siviwe Mpengesi, would address the media on “key matters”.
Previous seasons have been punctuated by a lack of communication by the club with local media.
On the face of it, not much has changed.
Requests to speak to the new Chippa coach, Sinethemba Badela, from June have yet to be granted. Badela addressed Johannesburg-based media at the season’s launch on Tuesday.
On Monday, The Herald sent questions to Mpengesi regarding the allocation of fixtures for the season.
The schedule shows 10 home matches in East London and five in Gqeberha, a departure from the norm in recent years. These questions were ignored.
The club appears to have forgotten that there is the matter of Chippa being accountable to every ratepayer in the metro.
It is the people of the Bay who are paying for Chippa to be based in the metro, and they deserve to know about the dealings of the club.
It’s not just about new signings; it’s about the entire operation.
A lack of transparency arises when no media are allowed to ask questions or interrogate decisions made by the club. This has been the case for many seasons.
Hopefully, some pressing questions will be answered on Thursday.
The Herald
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