Rayon Sport: Internal politics killing the club

It is an open secret in football circles that for football to be vibrant, then the most supported club in the country should be organized and winning trophies.

Saturday, August 29, 2009
Rayon Sports president Senator Valens Munyabagisha

It is an open secret in football circles that for football to be vibrant, then the most supported club in the country should be organized and winning trophies.

But the opposite is what is happening at Rayon Sport. As other clubs are busy signing players and offering contract extensions to their star players, Rayon Sport are only looking on as their prize jewels get lured to the better organized and trophy hungry clubs.

Midfielder Albert Ngabo and striker Jimmy Gatete, who is also the club captain, could be on their way to MTN Peace Cup winners, Atraco Fc.

The Blues have gone five seasons without winning any trophy, a situation that is becoming intolerable to their passionate fans, who always follow their team’s every game in their thousands.

Internal politics and bickering are always a major theme whenever the Rayon Sport General Assembly meets to iron out the club’s agenda, and that is why the club’s trophy cabinet is covered with cobweb instead of trophies.

One thing that the country’s most supported club have failed to emulate from their rivals, APR and Atraco is proper management of the club affairs on and off the field.

Whereas APR and Atraco always disagree about various things in the club, they always respect the decisions of the club’s hierarchy, a situation that is non existent at Rayon Sport.

For a club of Rayon’s stature and pedigree, such things should not be happening. Perhaps they could look at English club Newcastle United and see what football politics can do to a club however big or small it may be.

Proper management is key to success, not necessarily in terms of winning trophies but it encourages stability.

While it is probably unthinkable [or impossible] for the Blues to be relegated from the top flight division, there is no guarantee that they will win the league title in the next two to three years.

Newcastle United is one of the top four most supported clubs in English football along with Manchester United, Manchester City and probably Nottingham Forest.

They [Newcastle] had the third largest stadium after Man United and recently Arsenal, but that’s did not stop them from getting relegated.

It is very ironical the extent to which a typical Rayon Sport fan can do so that the club wins some silverware, but instead their fanatical supporters want to dictate what the club should do and not do in order to regain their lost prowess.

The Blues have been hit by one nightmare after the other and the situation is unlikely to improve any time soon. They no longer have to contend with fighting for the league title with just their archrivals APR, but they now have another powerful rival in Atraco, who nearly bagged a sensational treble last season. But we all know who Rayon fans hate/dread most.

With the kind of fanatical support that the Rayon Sport enjoys, there is no way the club should be complaining about not having enough resources to compete for trophies against APR and Atraco.

Ends