FORMER Premier Soccer League (PSL) side Bantu Rovers are reportedly in serious player recruitment mode as they plot a return to top-flight action in the 2015 season. FORTUNE MBELE SPORTS REPORTER
Sources said Tshintsha Guluva, owned by Methembe “Mayor” Ndlovu, were courting Chicken Inn striker Mkhokheli Dube seeking to beef up their squad for the 2014 season to win the Zifa Southern Region Division One League. They took position three last year behind Plumtree Chiefs (then Bulawayo Chiefs) and Black Boots.
Chicken Inn head coach Joey Antipas is said to be interested in Dube, who finished last season in good form after the former Absa PSL’s AmaZulu and US-based striker was not given enough game time under Mandla “Lulu” Mpofu.
Bantu Rovers will go into one week-long trials this week beginning today using the outside pitches at Barbourfields Stadium in Bulawayo.
Club secretary Wilbert Sibanda yesterday said after the trials, some new players that Rovers have roped in will be joining the rest of the squad from last year’s team next week for training before going into camp on January 21 for intensive training in preparation for the 2014 Division One season.
“We start with trials tomorrow (today), probably at BF (Barbourfields Satdium) and this year, there are no two ways, we are gunning for the championship. We just need to beef our squad up with a considerable number of players. We are retaining most of our senior players. We start with the trials and then the team assembles next week with the new players that we have brought in before we go into camp on January 21. This year it’s serious business,” Sibanda said.
Former Warriors and Highlanders midfielder Johannes Ngodzo will be in charge of the team while the rest of the technical team will be announced in due course.
Bantu Rovers, who were in the PSL in 2009 and 2010 have the likes of Nqobizitha Masuku, Graham Ncube, Makhosi Ncube, veteran Chipo Tsodzo, Abraham Mbaiwa, Fortune “Fokoza” Ncube and Under-20 Young Warriors defender Teenage Hadebe. Ndlovu has finished serving a two-year ban from football for his alleged involvement in the Asiagate match-fixing scandal, but is determined to return to top-flight football.
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Last year, his organisation Grassroot Soccer Zimbabwe opened, the Fifa Football for Hope Centre in Gwabalanda and is also involved in a football partnership with Barclays Bank.
