For a very long time, it has proven to be difficult for elite league newcomers to sustain themselves in the first season.
Normally, teams would be relegated back to the First Division in the very next season.
Currently, Palapye-based side, Motlakase, have already booked themselves a ticket to the Premier League after winning automatic promotion from the Northern First Division.
Already many people are wondering whether Motlakase will make it or if they are just going to be short-term visitors, as has been the case with other teams in the past.
As it is, teams that got promoted last season are finding the going tough and look set to make it back to the First Division next season. Great North Tigers and Naughty Boys are trailing the league at a crucial moment, meaning that they are bound to get relegated.
Naughty Boys got promoted again in the 2005/6 season and were immediately relegated. They seem not to have learned anything from their past experience.
Mogoditshane Fighters, together with Police XI, was once one of those teams that struggled to stay in the Premier League, but currently both teams seem to have found their survival strategy.
The team that has so far surprised many is Boteti, who won the promotion two seasons ago and look set to stay in the premier league again this season.
Boteti did not bring many experienced players when they won promotion but used mostly players from the lower division.
Other teams that also made a short stay in the elite league include the likes of Jwaneng Comets, Mahalapye United Hotspurs, Blue Diamonds and Orapa Wanderers.
Information reaching Sunday Standard is that Motlakase will leave no stone unturned in their quest to stay in top flight football. Although they do not have an official sponsor, money is reported not to be a problem at the team.
The team has already targeted certain top players in the Premier League, some of whom reportedly having already signed pre-contracts.
The Public Relations Officer of the team, Monty Gagomokgwa, made it clear that they will not be coming to the Premier League to make up the numbers but to compete.
“Before we got promoted to the Premier League, we had a three year programme and it worked well for us. Right now we also have a survival strategy in the Premier League. Our intention in the first year of top flight football is to sustain the pressure and survive and then, the following year, we will be fighting for honours,” he said.
Gagomokgwa also made it clear that, for the team to survive, they should beef up with experienced players, something he said they are in the process of doing.
He did not want to comment on the players they are targeting but he, however, said they are also scouting in neighbouring countries and even those that are far afield.
“We are really serious at the club and, in the long run, we want to bring a new dimension in the team by bringing players from other parts of Africa who have never played in the country before,” he said.
Gagomokwa added that their current players understand their point of bringing in experienced players for the benefit of the team. He said they do not want a situation whereby the team is divided into two camps of new arrivals and old guards.
Meanwhile, the issue that still haunts them is the ground for their home games. He, however, stressed that they are about to solve the problem. He said they are on the verge of getting land and, once it materialises, they would immediately develop it, more or less along the same lines as Jwaneng’s Galaxy Stadium.
