The Botswana Football Association (BFA) refereeing duo of Armstrong Tumelo and Orebotse Kekobang are currently attending a four-day virtual course on officiating beach football courtesy of COSAFA. The online exercise, which started on Tuesday saw participants enduring three hours of coursework daily. The drill will end today, Friday, June 4, 2021.

BFA Referees Manager, Phodiso Jonti Rasetsoga said the training came at the right time as COSAFA is currently planning to introduce beach football into their competitions catalogue, hence they found it fit to educate regional referees.

Rasetshoga said, “Although COSAFA has not come up with the exact dates for staging of this competition, it wants to include it in their competitions in future. The referees are trained on officiating both 5-aside football and beach football,” said Rasetsoga.

One of the participants, Tumelo, who is a Botswana retired referee expressed confidence on gaining all necessary knowledge so he could later become an instructor to other Batswana referees who may want to officiate beach football in the future.

Orebotse Kekobang

Her counterpart, Kekobang is a Motswana female football referee in the 5-aside football category and was also confident that after the four days of training, she will be well equipped to exercise her refereeing duties diligently.

Meanwhile, BFA Youth Development Officer, Odirile China Matlhaku said it is significant for COSAFA to conduct this course, as beach soccer and 5-aside are completely different from general football.

“Futsal 5-aside is completely different from football. It has its own rules. For instance, there are no throw-ins in beach soccer and five aside, and they also use roll-on substitutes, something that does not apply on 11-man football,” added Matlhaku.  

The duo was equipped with all the necessary tools by the BFA at Lekidi Football Centre to undergo their online training.