La Liga to support SAFA in the formation of a national women’s league

The South African Football Association's (Safa) National Executive Committee (NEC) has endorsed a motion for the formation of a National Women’s League in 2019.

Safa president Danny Jordaan made the revelation on Tuesday while speaking on the sidelines of a press conference held in Soweto to reaffirm the cooperation agreement between the mother body and La Liga.

“When we started in 2012‚ we had 200 000 women footballers in the country‚" said Jordaan.

"Today we have about 450 000 and we want to get this number to up to a million.

"Women are the majority in this country‚ so women sport is one of the key areas where we need growth.

“It is for this reason that in 2019 we want to have a national league for women’s football where they will play like the PSL and NFD.

"I am not calling it a professional league just yet but a national league because whether it becomes professional or not it will depend on the support it is going to get.

"We have spoken to La Liga and they are happy to give us support and there is a lot of work to be done to make this a reality.”

Jordaan added that the nine provincial Sasol Women’s League winners will be promoted together with Varsity Cup winners and they will join automatic qualifiers Mamelodi Sundowns and Bloemfontein Celtic.

“There are two PSL women’s teams that are there already in the form of Bloemfontein Celtic and Mamelodi Sundowns.

"They will be in that league‚ including the winners of the universities league and the nine provinces to make the 12 teams that will form part of the national league.

“It was a decision of the NEC last weekend.

"We wanted to start the league in 2018 but the NEC discussed the matter and they said our current Sasol League is coming to an end.

"The teams that are playing in the Sasol League must get the information and the 2018 season starts in January next year.

"We must inform them that the provincial winners of the 2018 Sasol League will be promoted into the national league and that will be fair.

"You cannot keep quiet and in the end just announce that there will be promotion.”

 - TimesLIVE