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SIX years ago, the domestic Premier Soccer League championship was unbranded and Motor Action, who were crowned champions at the end of the campaign, received nothing for their spirited efforts which saw them relegating giants Dynamos, who are serial winners of the title, into second place.It was a dark period for the country’s top-flight football league which, without a flagship sponsor, resembled an amateur league and we all felt for the Mighty Bulls because in this game winners of the domestic league title need to be rewarded because it’s not an easy adventure with 30 games to negotiate throughout the year.

The following season Delta Beverages came on board and went into bed with the PSL, becoming the league’s flagship sponsors in a partnership that is still alive today.

Two years ago, Delta Beverages also announced the sponsorship of a knock-out football tournament for the PSL when the company revived the Chibuku Super Cup, an iconic tourney in this country that had been a part of our national game’s DNA until it disappeared off the radar in the ‘90s.

This season the same company announced that they have invested $500 000 into the Chibuku Super Cup, quite a significant investment into our football in the current harsh economic climate and also a massive vote of confidence in the domestic Premiership despite the top-flight league continuing to lose most of its star players either to South Africa or Tanzania.

But sadly, we get the feeling that some players and clubs in our Premiership are not attaching a lot of value to that massive investment by Delta Beverages, who have provided the funding to oil the league’s machinery despite the gloomy economic environment.

And regrettably, it’s not the small boys who are making a mockery of the professionalism that we expect from them and which the sponsors really value a lot, but the big boys who should ordinarily be leading by example in this sphere.

We can’t understand the madness that rocked the CAPS United camp last Saturday when the club’s players decided to stage a rebellion while seated in the team bus just before their Chibuku Super Cup first round tie against Tsholotsho at the National Sports Stadium.

In what was tantamount to insulting the sponsors, the fans who came to watch the game and the opponents who had travelled all the way from Bulawayo, the CAPS United players chose to stage a sit-in in their team bus because it is claimed the club had delayed paying their August salaries by two weeks.

Somehow, a group of professional footballers who had the whole week to resolve issues with their management somehow decided to wait until the last minute when they had already arrived at the stadium to stage their protest and in the process delayed the match by more than 30 minutes.

It could have been a ploy to hold their management to ransom, given that by delaying their protest until the very last-minute, they left the club officials with no time to draft in replacements who were prepared to feature in the match, but the bottom line is that it also was a slap in the face of the sponsors, who have injected a fortune to keep the game afloat, and the fans who keep this game alive.

Of course, the CAPS United management have to find ways of resolving the pay disputes that have been stalking their camp for some time now and the players need to be paid because as professionals it’s their only means of survival and they have families to take care of.

But that still doesn’t give the players the licence to import their in-house problems into the domain of the sponsors, the fans and the opposition who have nothing to do with the challenges in the Green Machine camp.

Sadly, CAPS United are not alone among the giants who have been behaving badly.

Dynamos, the country’s biggest and most successful football club, have also been in turmoil which has been damaging the profile of the top-flight league and when that happens the sponsor’s name is dragged into the mud for no apparent reason.

The Glamour Boys’ camp was this week reeling from chaos after club president Kenny Mubaiwa announced the sacking of assistant coach Murape Murape only for that dismissal to be overturned by the club’s board with the former striker taking his place on the technical bench in the game against Tsholotsho just a day after the announcement of his dismissal.

When such things happen, and the negative Press it generates, it can soil the image of the sponsors and Delta Beverages officials must have been shaking their heads this week while we fear that BancABC, who have been sponsoring Dynamos for years now could even be forced to reconsider their relationship with the club.

We aren’t surprised of course that the attendance figures have taken a battering because when there is so much negativity the fans simply stay away from the madness.