Young referee aims high

The future looks bright for a young local football referee, Russel Mabilu. At the age of 13, Mabilu has already achieved what many much older referees can only hope to one day achieve. The Makhuvha-born referee is one of the panel members for the SAB League.

Mabilu joined refereeing towards the end of last year. According to him, it all started in October last year when he, together with friends, were playing soccer at a local ground. While playing he realized that the referees’ selector, Mr Eric Munyai, was busy training young referees at the other end of the ground. Mabilu approached Munyai and told him that he wanted to pursue refereeing as a career.

After a few weeks of coaching and mentoring, Munyai realised that Mabilu was capable of officiating at local football association matches. He then started to use Mabilu as his assistant when officiating at Thulamela Local Football Association league matches.

Mabilu was promoted to officiate at the SAB League matches early this year. He has already officiated in 12 matches since he was promoted to the SAB League panel.

He stated that his most difficult game was between Shadani Dangerous Scorpions and Jack Cliffy FC at Shadani grounds two months ago. The game, which kept the diminutive referee running from the onset to the bitter end, ended in a 1-1 draw.

When asked about referees who solicit bribes from club officials in exchange for results, Mabilu said he will never fall into that kind of temptation. “I don’t want to cut my refereeing career short by taking bribes,” he said.

The Grade 8 pupil at Muhuyuwathomba Secondary School said that his dream was to officiate in Premier Soccer League matches.

Date:10 April 2017

By: Frank Mavhungu

Frank is a Human Resources Manager at the Department of Public Works in Limpopo. He is the longest serving correspondent of the Mirror, having joined us at the end of 1990.  He mainly writes sports reports and resides at Tsianda Village. In 2004, Frank won the National Castle League Award, an award for the best reporter in the SAB league in South Africa.

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