Sulom clears Escom’s fears on refs

The Super League of Malawi (Sulom) has cleared Escom United’s fears of allocating referees to matches played outside their bases, insisting that it was just a suggestion which will not be implemented.

If anything, Sulom has said, it will only relocate referees in the very last fixtures.

Escom claimed that Sulom wanted to fiddle with match officials in the remaining TNM Super League matches to target some teams as the chase for the championship reaches the climax.

The Sulom general secretary Williams Banda laughed off Escom’s claims.

“To begin with, since the league has reached a critical stage, there are bound to be such talks.

“Secondly, while there was indeed that suggestion, it was agreed that we should not implement it because other teams might interpret it wrongly and they [Escom] might have been tipped about it.

“It was just a suggestion aimed at ensuring that officiation should be firm as we head towards the conclusion. There were no sinister plans whatsoever,” Banda said.

Escom chairperson Fanuel Nkhono claimed that Sulom wants to relocate referees to pave the way for unnamed teams to win the league.

Said Nkhono: “We have reliable information that Sulom want to fiddle with match officials. They want to allocate games to referees who are not based where the matches will be played and our position is that it is unfair because it will be seen like they [Sulom] are targeting certain teams.

“Why should that happen now, when some teams have played 96 percent of their games? It is unfair and dubious.”

But Nkhono could not be drawn to name the teams that Sulom is targeting.

Escom are currently at the top of the log table with 47 points with a game to wrap up the season.

Silver Strikers are on second position with 42 points, with three games to go. Blantyre United are third also with 42 points and two games to wrap up the season while Civo United are fourth 41 points from 24 games. Mighty Wanderers, who are on seventh position with 38 points from 24 games, also have an outside chance.

Silver host Nomads in Lilongwe on Saturday while on Sunday the Nomads engage Epac. Civo will travel to Blantyre to face Azam Tigers and Zomba United on Saturday and Sunday respectively. Escom and Blantyre United have no fixtures this weekend.