SuperSport CEO happy women’s team wait is over

The announcement comes several weeks after SABC Sport first reported on the imminent deal with the Hollywoodbets Super League outfit as part of a recommendation from the continental mother body CAF.

Matthews believes the club is ready to take on the responsibility.

"We've been looking to introduce a women's team to the club probably the last two seasons. We've toyed with it and got cold feet in a way. Little afraid of taking much more as a football club, especially last year losing Kaitano [Tembo], getting down Gavin [Hunt] back into the club. We would have loved to have launched a ladies' partnership last year but it was a bridge too far for us too soon," Matthews said.

CAF requires all teams involved in their competitions to – at the very least – have an affiliation with a ladies side.

Matthews explains why TUT ticked all the boxes.

"Now especially having finished in the top three, it wasn't an option anymore. We had to do it to comply with our club licensing, so we've taken a couple of months to go into the market and meet with a few clubs and see which ones tick the boxes for us," he explained.

"In terms of synergies and value system and we found a couple that had really good value systems but the one that appealed to us the most was TUT because the synergies are there. 

We are playing matches at their stadium. We have had a 25-year relationship with the institution."

The tertiary institution, who will now be renamed TUT Matsatsantsa Ladies FC, are no strangers to the SuperSport set up according to Matthews.

"We've recruited over a dozen students from Pretoria Technikon and TUT that have become employees not only in our football club but also the broadcast company and even marketing and activation companies.

So, we've got good success there. Our biokineticist comes from TUT, our exercise scientist have come from TUT. One of our academy administrators comes from TUT. So, we've got a long history of unearthing talent at TUT off the field."