{"id":8752,"date":"2012-03-10T03:00:47","date_gmt":"2012-03-10T01:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/03\/soccer-safrican-club-suspend-coach-over-pay-to-play-allegation\/"},"modified":"2012-03-10T03:00:47","modified_gmt":"2012-03-10T01:00:47","slug":"soccer-safrican-club-suspend-coach-over-pay-to-play-allegation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/soccer-safrican-club-suspend-coach-over-pay-to-play-allegation\/","title":{"rendered":"Soccer-SAfrican club suspend coach over &#8216;pay to play&#8217; allegation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">JOHANNESBURG, March 9<\/span> (Reuters) &#8211; South African<br \/>\npremier league club Platinum Stars have suspended coach Owen da<br \/>\nGama while they investigate allegations he demanded payments<br \/>\nfrom players to pick them for the team, a statement said on<br \/>\nFriday.<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The club ordered an independent inquiry and asked Da Gama to<br \/>\nstand aside while the investigation is conducted.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Platinum Stars would like to announce that following<br \/>\ntroubling allegations in the media surrounding the head coach,<br \/>\nOwen da Gama, the club felt that it has become necessary to<br \/>\nconduct a formal investigation into the matter,&#8221; the statement<br \/>\nsaid.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;An independent team will be appointed to look into the<br \/>\nissues and will call upon witnesses, including Da Gama himself,<br \/>\nto provide information that will assist in making<br \/>\nrecommendations to the board.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Last month unidentified players alleged in a tabloid that<br \/>\nthey had to &#8220;pay to play&#8221; but Da Gama denied the accusations.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The club said he had taken legal action against<br \/>\nJohannesburg&#8217;s Sunday World newspaper.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The struggling club are owned by the Bafokeng tribe and<br \/>\nbased in Rustenburg. They are headquartered at the same complex<br \/>\nwhere England stayed during the 2010 World Cup.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Da Gama is in his second spell as coach of the club. He won<br \/>\nthe League Cup with Stars in 2006.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>South African-born Da Gama played at Derry City in the<br \/>\nLeague of Ireland and at Germinal Beerschot in Belgium during<br \/>\nhis playing days.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>(Reporting by Mark Gleeson in Cape Town; Editing by Mark<br \/>\nMeadows)<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright\">\n<p>         \t\t\u00a9 Thomson Reuters 2012 All rights reserved<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>JOHANNESBURG, March 9 (Reuters) &#8211; South African premier league club Platinum Stars have suspended coach Owen da Gama while they investigate allegations he demanded payments from players to pick them for the team, a statement said on Friday. The club ordered an independent inquiry and asked Da Gama to stand aside while the investigation is [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-8752","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8752\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}