Two PIS cup games abandoned

Two Presidential Cup round of 16 qualifying games ended prematurely on Wednesday in Mwanza and the capital city.

In Mwanza, referee Fransisco Scova was forced to abandon the game between Ntelo and Chinangwa Madrid after he was slapped by a fan allegedly belonging to Ntelo.

At Silver Stadium in Lilongwe, the game between Epac FC and Kasungu Police was abandoned in the second-half after the cops walked out of the pitch in protest against a penalty awarded to Epac.

The Mwanza incident occurred in the 77th minute as Chinangwa Madrid led 1-0.

Scova, who is among local top referees, confirmed the incident, saying he had to call off the game due to lack of adequate security.

“What happened was that I showed Ntelo’s captain [Luciano Zacharia] the yellow card for a crude tackle. I later showed him a red card following another tackle and he was sent off the pitch.

“Deep into the second-half, two Ntelo players collided and I had to stop the game briefly so that they could be attended to by first aid personnel.

“It was at this point that one of Ntelo’s fans, who had invaded the pitch, slapped me in the face and even some of their players charged at me while shouting all sorts of insults.

“Of course, police calmed down the situation, but I decided to call off the game due to lack of security because a fan could not invade the pitch and attack a match official in the presence of security,” said Scova.

He said he has included the incident in his match report to Football Association of Malawi (FAM) for their perusal.

Scova, who is general secretary of the Southern Region Referees Committee (SRRC), rubbished reports that he pulled the strings for Chinangwa Madrid because their coach, Sam Mangasanja, is a fellow referees’ official.

“That is all nonsense. In fact, I did not even know that Mangasanja is associated with this team.

“What I know is that when you are an active referee, you are not supposed to be directly involved with any club and to my knowledge, Mangasanja retired from active refereeing although he is still an official,” said Scova.

The Lilongwe game was 0-0 when Kasungu Police walked out in protest.

Another match between Mafco and Montour failed to take place because the latter did not show up at Chitowe in Dwangwa.

Reacting to the two incidents, FAM competitions officer Gomezgani Zakazaka said while they were yet to get reports from the match officials, they have already been briefed on what happened.

On the Epac vs Kasungu Police match, Zakazaka said: “Similarly, the rules are clear on the team that walks out in protest. If Kasungu were not happy with officiation, they could have still played under protest other than walking out. Neverthless, we will wait for an official report as well.”