Professor Ronnie Schloss confirms Bay United sale
League approves Bay United sale
Posted: 2010-07-24 11:26
Financially-troubled Bay United has been sold. This has been confirmed by League COO Professor Ronnie Schloss, but the identity of the new owners was not disclosed.
“The PSL has approved the sale of the franchise to a new company, but the team will have to remain based in Port Elizabeth without a change of home venue, colours and name. This is in terms of the rules and regulations of the League and if the new owners want to relocate then they have to file an application,” Schloss told KickOff.com.
Schloss did not indicate whether safeguards were instituted to protect Umlilo’s current crop of players, or what steps were taken to ensure outstanding monies owed by former Umlilo owner Sipho Pityana to players would be settled in full.
Yesterday KickOff.com revealed that former Premier Soccer League club African Wanderers’ were bidding to buy the franchise of coastal stream first division campaigners for R5 million.
Wanderers director and chairman Zibuse Mlaba confirms that their attempts failed just as they were attempting to lure Vladislav Heric to take over as their new coach.
“We had finalised the agreement with the Bay representatives last Friday which gave us the go ahead to process the payment and then apply for approval to PSL to then change the name and relocate to KZN.
“But the PSL turned our application to change the name and relocate the club. We were told whoever buys the club must stay put in Eastern Cape.
“Our situation is that we cannot buy a team and then have to play in Port Elizabeth and still use the name Bay. From what we have gathered this is a political move aimed at least making sure that the stadium in Port Elizabeth is used.
“Our understanding was that since we would still be in the same Coastal Stream the deal would go through smoothly. But we have now been told that we just cannot change the name and relocate and that is non-negotiable as it is already late to change the fixtures.
“It is no use buying the club when we will go on to spend an extra R2-million to move players and for transport to play our home games in Port Elizabeth,” laments Mlaba who is brother to Ethekwini Mayor Obed.
Wanderers had already planned on relocating to Pinetown and would use the renovated Sugar Ray Xulu Stadium in Clermont as their home ground.
“The deal that had already been signed by Bay is off and we just have to live with the expenses of reversing the deal. With the way things have since happened we are now scared of approaching another seller even if there is someone else selling their club like Carara Kicks.
“We are now left with no option but to go back and play in the Vodacom League, where we will still spend the money that we had intended to spend in acquiring a franchise in buying new players and bringing in a reputable coach. Maybe this will be fine for us as it will be cheaper to gain promotion than buy.
“We had already earmarked Vladislav Heric to our coach having already started the negotiations but he will now be going back to Leopards. We had also not signed any players as yet and reports that we had signed any players are wrong and misleading…how can we sign new players when we hadn’t brought in a new coach as yet,” says Mlaba.
Schloss does confirm having received incomplete documentation from Wanderers but says Bay has since been bought by another company that will keep the club in Port Elizabeth.
“We didn’t receive all the needed documentation from African Wanderers regarding the relocation,” says Schloss. “From what we have received and approved Bay United will have new owners who will keep the team in Port Elizabeth.”
Attempts to get hold of Pityana for comment proved futile. A lady who answered his mobile phone asked a series of questions about why KickOff.com wanted to talk to Pityana and then said he would get back to us later.
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