Fort Hare, Bohemians are in with a chance
BORDER club cricket teams Fort Hare and Bohemians may have free passage into the Momentum National Club Championship and the Multiply T20 Community Cup competitions respectively after Eastern Province were unable to produce their club champions yesterday afternoon.
The play-off for the club champs was set to be played in Alice today, while the Community Cup play-off was scheduled to be played in Port Elizabeth tomorrow,
However with an unresolved appeal lodged by PE's United Cricket Club, which if ruled in their favour, would see them move above Gelvandale Cricket Club who are currently top of the log, these matches will not be played this weekend.
“There was a disciplinary committee hearing two weeks ago that dealt with the issue of a game that could have declared a winner of the league,” said EP cricket president Donavan May.
“The disciplinary committee decided that the points from the called off game should be shared between the two teams according to our playing conditions and bye laws.”
“There was then an appeal lodged by United Cricket Club against the decision taken. The appeal was then referred back to the disciplinary committee who said that they cannot change their decision as it was binding.”
According to May the matter was then referred to different people, including the CEO of EP Cricket, to negotiate between the two parties, however this also proved unsuccessful.
The matter was then referred back to the board who then made the decision yesterday to take the matter to arbitration.
EP cricket are now reportedly in negotiations with Cricket South Africa to see if they can play the play-offs at another time.
However with the Community Cup set to get under way next week it would mean that the competition would probably have to be delayed, as the likely hood of arbitration happening before then is very unlikely.
Despite the uncertainty over who would represent EP in the play-offs, Fort Hare had been hard at work training over the last week and were ready for the match.
“When I was growing up I was told control what you can and leave the other stuff that you can't control, so for us it doesn't matter whether United come or Gelvandale. We have prepared for the game and we are ready.,” said Fort Hare coach Mfuneko Ngam before the official decision from EP cricket.
To make the club champs qualifier Fort Hare had triumphed in the Border Premier League competition, while with the T20 Community Cup being exclusively for club teams, Bohemians who finished second on the Premier League log became the Border reps.
Border and EP will now have to wait for an official decision to be communicated from CSA to see if the play-offs will be held, or if the Border teams will be put through.