An under-21 national league is in the pipeline... |
Newly-elected
Lesotho Basketball Association (LBA) director of development Faku Masupha says
the LBA will re-introduce a developmental league for under-21 players this year.
Although
Masupha didn’t give an exact date, the changes will probably come into effect
when the 2018/19 campaign starts in August because the current season is
already well underway.
The development
league has not been played since 2015.
Masupha, who
founded the successful Bokamoso Basketball Development Program in 2012, said the
competition’s absence has affected the standard of the LBA’s top league, the
National Basketball League (NBL) A-League. He said discussions are underway to
introduce rules that will require all NBL clubs to have development league
teams.
The grand
vision, he added, includes a national league system beginning at primary schools.
“A
developmental pipeline has different stages of which a player has to pass
through before reaching the elite level,” Masupha explained.
“If things are
go well we have to start from the cadet league targeting primary schools pupils
and children at the community level, followed by a (high) school league,
developmental league, promotional league and then the elite league.”
He continued: “At
the moment we only have the high school league and the elite national league. We
need to improve our players’ transition from grassroots level to professional
level.”
Masupha said the
developmental league will help to prepare young players for the pressures of
the NBL A-League.
“The absence
of a developmental league kills a lot of local talent because some players jump
straight to the senior league once they leave high school league, so what
happens is they arrive in the league immature and are unable stand the pressure
against old, experienced players. Because of that they end up losing interest in
the sport,” he said.
Masupha said Lesotho
needs to take youth development more seriously and that includes companies having
a more impactful involvement in supporting development programmes.
“Development
is the anchor position of the LBA, it is the anchor to any sporting code but
requires proper planning that is properly monitored,” he said.
“For example,
I planned to have Bokamoso Basketball Development programme back in 2011, I
groomed most of the kids from the ages of 13 and 14 but we are only seeing
results now,” Masupha added.
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