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Royal Cup Trust chief executive officer, Nkosilathi Ndiweni, unveils the banner and logo for the Royal Cup tournament in Bulawayo last year in December

Ricky Zililo, Senior Sports Reporter
ORGANISERS of the Royal Cup say they have finally secured prize money for participating teams, with the winner of the clash between Highlanders and Swaziland’s Manzini Wanderers set to pocket $10 000.

Royal Cup Trust chief executive officer Nkosilathi Ndiweni emerged from Monday’s meeting with officials from the Sports and Recreation Commission (SRC) and Ministry of Sport and Recreation confident of staging a memorable match.

The clash between Highlanders and Manzini Wanderers is set for March 19 at Barbourfields Stadium.

Ndiweni said they had agreed in principle with participating teams on the players’ appearance fees and prize money.

“The tournament is still on and we’re busy working on the modalities and making sure that we follow proper channels to get everything on track. We’re hoping to have the participating teams signing agreements soon as we’ve basically agreed in principle on everything. The issues to do with players’ appearance fees and prizes have all been agreed on,” said Ndiweni.

“The men’s winners will take home $10 000 with the losers walking away with $7 000, while winners of the women’s match, which will curtain raise the men’s game, will take home $5 000 and the losers $3 000,” said Ndiweni.

Organisers of the cup were forced to postpone the tournament from February 16 to March 19 as Highlanders were scheduled to play FC Platinum in the semi-finals of the ZNA Charity Shield.

Prior to that, Bosso had threatened to pull out citing non-commitment on the part of the organisers to meet the club’s requirements.

Highlanders had asked the organisers to guarantee payment of players’ camping fees and appearance fees as well as disclosing the prize package for the cup.

After much haggling Bosso pulled out and instead went to South Africa for a five-day training camp in Polokwane, Limpopo Province.

Now the Royal Cup Trust has set a new date for the match and remains hopeful Bosso will come on board to take on the Swazi team on March 19.

The Highlanders executive is on record as saying the club would not turn down taking part in any tournaments as long as the institution benefits from such events.

Bosso need every cent at this stage to cushion their finances which are in a bad state following BancABC’s reduction of the sponsorship package by half to $200 000.

@ZililoR