JOMO COSMOS RELEGATED, SO WHAT?
JOHANNESBURG. — Jomo Sono remains defiant despite his Jomo Cosmos side being relegated from the GladAfrica Championship to drop out of the professional ranks of South African football.
The club provided a springboard for Benjani Mwaruwari and Kennedy Nagoli to complete their moves to Europe and South America.
Sono insisted that he would not attempt to purchase the status of a fellow team to buy his way back into the GladAfrica Championship.
Ezenkosi will now compete in the ABC Motsepe league next season, with Sono in good spirits despite a disastrous end to the campaign.
“I’m not going to buy someone else’s status,” Sono said.
“I don’t have a problem with people who do that but I’m not going to do it. If I’m relegated, I’m going to play in the ABC Motsepe League.
“Why would I be sad?
“I’m not sad at all because if I’m relegated, I’m still going to be playing football in the ABC Motsepe League. It’s not like I will be switching to swimming.
“I will still be doing something that I love. As long as it’s football I can even go and play at Kwa Mai Mai.
“The things I have achieved in football are there for everyone to see and no one is going to erase them. They will always be there.
“I’ve won six trophies but when I bought Highlands Park and formed this club my aim wasn’t to challenge for titles.
“All I wanted was to develop and sell players. I did that and I will still be developing players even if I get relegated.”
Ezenkosi last spent a season in the Premiership in 2015-2016.
Cosmos were founded in January 1983 when Orlando Pirates great Sono, one of the best players produced by SA, bought the franchise of the once-powerhouse of the old all-white National
Football League Highlands Park.
Four years later, under their legendary coach Roy Matthews, Cosmos won the 1987 National Soccer League title and finished in second place the following year.
They remained competitive through the late 1980s and early 1990s ending fourth, fifth, seventh and fifth in the next four seasons, until their first relegation from the top-flight in 1992.
They returned to the NSL in 1995 and competed as a mostly top eight-finishing combination and renowned nursery of talent in the new Premier Soccer League until a second relegation in 2007-2008.
After a spell as a yo-yo team between the First Division and PSL, Cosmos have spent the past five years in the NFD, now renamed the GladAfrica.
In all Cosmos have won five trophies, the 1990 BobSave SuperBowl and Telkom Knockouts in 2002, 2003 and 2005 adding to their 1987 league title.