Premier Soccer League

Premier Soccer League

Founded	1996
Divisions	Premier Division National First Division
Relegation to	SAFA Second Division
Domestic cup(s)	Telkom Knockout MTN 8 Nedbank Cup
2013–14 South African Premier Division

The Premier Soccer League is a league competition featuring professional association football clubs from South Africa. It is the top level football league in South Africa and has been since its foundation in 1996.

The PSL was created following an agreement between the National Soccer League and the remnants of the National Premier Soccer League (NPSL). The Premier Soccer League is a trading name for the National Soccer League. The Premier Division is seen as a successor of the National Soccer League.

The company acts as a governing body and competition organiser. The PSL are affiliated to the South African Football Association but SAFA do not govern the PSL competitions. Teams that are relegated from the PSL organised leagues compete in the SAFA-organised Second Division.

Competitions

The Premier Soccer League sell the naming rights of their competitions to a title sponsor. The PSL organise the following competitions:

League competitions

• South African Premier Division
• National First Division

Cup competitions

• South African Cup
• League Cup
• Top Eight Cup

They had previously organised Charity Cup, a one day, four team, season opening cup, which ran from 1986 to 2010. The Baymed Cup was open to First Division sides, but the competition was terminated after one edition in 2006 Baymed Cup.

League licenses

Licenses to participate in the league can be bought and sold on the free market. In August 2002, the PSL bought two Premier Division licences, from the owners of Ria Stars F.C. and Free State Stars F.C., the PSL dissolved the license to ease fixture congestion and reduce their own costs by 400k ZAR per month as each top tier club received 200k ZAR on a monthly basis from the PSL.^[1] The two clubs were purchased for 8million ZAR. The two clubs had differing fates, Ria Stars never appeared again whilst Free State Stars bought the league license from Maholosiane F.C., a team participating in the National First Division in the 2002/2003 season and earned promotion to the top tier in the 2003/2004 season.

Structure

The NSL is the only special member of the South African Football Association (SAFA). The NSL has 32 members, the 16 clubs from the Premier Division and 16 clubs from the first division who together form the Board of governors. The Board of governors is the supreme body and its functions are stated in Article 13 of the NSL constitution. The Board of governors elects the Chairman and the Executive committee, it is empowered to delegate management and operational functions to the Executive Committee. The Executive committee consists of 8 elected members and the Chief Executive Officer. The Executive is appointed for a period of four years at the quadrennial general meeting. The Executive delegates some of its operational functions to the CEO.

References

External links

• South Africa Champions, RSSSF.com