Times Of Swaziland: E8M BOUNTY

E8M BOUNTY
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BY SANELE JELE on 20/09/2021 08:24:00


MBABANE – The country’s CAF Champions League envoy, Royal Leopard are 90
minutes away from pocketing a handsome E8 million bounty.
This will be possible if the police ensemble beat Angola’s Sagrada Esperança
in the second preliminary round of the CAF interclub main competition. If they
win, they will play in the group stages which come with a package of E8 million
for the team that finish as fourth in the group. According to the tournament
rules and regulations, the 16 winners of the second round will play in the group
stage, while the 16 losers will enter the CAF Confederation Cup play-off round.
Leopard PRO Frank Hurube said without the support from the nation they would not
have reached this stage.
“The journey continues and all thanks to emaSwati, EFA, management, technical
bench and the players. It is true that the higher you go the colder it becomes,
this means we will need more financial support from emaSwati as this next game
will require us to dig deep from the pocket,” Hurube said. The award-winning
PRO said for them to stand a chance of pocketing the E8 million they need to
invest more. “We were given a mandate to do well in Africa and we are doing
just that. It is not going to be easy but we will soldier on,” he said. He
also confirmed that Leopard arrived home last night after their game against
Zambia’s Zesco United. The Edwin Matsebula-led charges will play Esperança
next month. This is after they eliminated United on an aggregate score of 2-2,
Leopard advance due to the away goal rule in the first round in the preliminary
stage. The tie ended 2-1 in favour of the Zambians while the reverse fixture
played on September 11 saw the MTN League Champions winning 1-0.
host
The first leg will be played on the weekend of October 15-17 away while the
second leg will see Leopard host the Angolans on the weekend of October 22-24 at
Mavuso Sports Centre, Manzini. Meanwhile, Sagrada booted out Zimbabwe’s FC
Platinum with a 5-4 score line following a shootout to decide the winner. The
tie had ended without goals after another draw in the first leg last week. The
last team to reach the group stages was Mbababane Swallows in 2018. Before CAF
increased the package in 2017; group stages qualifiers were entitled to E5.8
million. In summary, the champions will receive E36.7 million while runners-up
will take home E17.7 million. The holders are Egypt’s Al Ahly while Kaizer
Chiefs were runners-up.