Real Overs Football Club has a problem with its football pitch due to overgrown grass inside and outside the playing field at Schoongezicht.
The club’s coach, Mr Vusi Magagula, says he has tried everything to get the grass mowed but he is not getting any help from the local municipality as the land belongs to them.
“I raised the grass issue two weeks ago and was told the cutting tractor had a mechanical problem. The last time this land was cut was in January. We used the services of a goalkeeper from another football ground and he told us to pay him 800 rand and buy 20 liters of petrol for the machine. He also did half the job because part of the land was not cut off, claiming that he ran out of gas. We are forced to use an alternate ground for our home games,” Magagula said.
Magagula added that the only thing he receives are promises from the municipality and lately his appeals are being ignored.
Another problem for the team is that once the grass was cut, other teams came to use the field, but with the grass overgrown, no one is using the ground.
Some of his players do not come to training for fear of injury.
Magagula feels they are not treated the same as other municipally owned lands in Klarinet and Pine Ridge.
They can’t even line up the pitch because of the grass. Visiting teams also complain about the poor condition of the pitch.
“I don’t understand that the municipality only has one tractor. We have teams in different age categories including our main team which makes it impossible to plan our match as we literally have no home ground. We also have a female football team which cannot use the pitch for security reasons. The land is also used by nearby Witbank Primary School for their sports activities. What do we tell our children if they can’t use a soccer field? We push them to smoke drugs because they can’t play soccer anymore. We hope someone can come and help us solve this problem. We also don’t have a sponsor, which makes it difficult to get a pitch in good condition. Magagula concluded.
A questionnaire was sent to the municipality for their response, but no response was received before printing.
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