SWAZILAND officials have admitted using over-age players in the recent Southern Africa youth championships in South Africa. “We cannot deny there were ineligible players and the buck stops with us because we approved the squad,” national football association president Adam Mthethwa told the Times of Swaziland. Defender Mxolisi Mthethwa admitted to the Times of Swaziland […]

ANDREW MUCHINERIPI, Tembisa | Saturday 7.00pm. Classic (3) 5 (Tucker 18-og, Mackett 39, Zwane 42, Matsitela 50, Mthunzi 63) Hellenic (1) 4 (Young 35, 73, Madida 48, O’Gorman 72) JUST when I was giving up on the ability of the Castle Premiership to provide anything more than degrees of mediocrity, along came Classic and Hellenic […]

BEN HIRSCHLER, London | Friday 7.15pm DIAMOND giant De Beers is expected to report record 1999 sales of uncut stones on Monday, with business through its London-based Central Selling Organisation topping $5-billion for the first time. Analysts polled by Reuters forecast sales of $5,0-billion to $5,3-billion compared with actual 1998 sales of $3,34-billion, an 11-year-low […]

STEVEN MANN, Johannesburg | Saturday 5.30pm. TWO people died in the head-on collision between two passenger trains near Kaalfontein east of Johannesburg and not three as originally reported, police said on Saturday. Rescue workers rigged up a crane in the early hours of Saturday morning to lift the mangled train carriages off the track, and […]

ANDREW MUCHINERIPI, Pretoria | Friday 8.00pm. IT is surely a case of when rather than if Roy Matthews is removed as coach of SuperSport United after they lost 1-0 at home to mid-table African Wanderers at Caledonian Stadium on Friday night. This was defeat No 11 in 21 Castle Premiership matches and Matthews, a hero […]

A BLISTERING 99 by Romesh Kaluwitharana launched Sri Lanka to a series-clinching six-wicket win over Zimbabwe in the fourth one-day international in Harare on Saturday. Zimbabwe totalled 260 for four to which Sri Lanka replied with 262 for four in 44.4 overs to win with 32 balls to spare. Kaluwitharana scored his runs off just […]

NEIL MANTHORP, East London | Saturday 7.00pm. ENGLAND’S bowlers battled under a blazing sun as a Border/Eastern Province combined XI reached an impressive 331 for five on the first day of their four-day match at Buffalo Park on Saturday. A perfect batting pitch offered little help to the England seamers who toiled as local men […]

Khadija Magardie talks to an artist who is using music to take religion to the youth When Shaheed GC embraced the Islamic faith at the age of 16, he thought he had firmly closed the door on a singing career that began in his early teens. At the time, he says, he felt that music, […]

Neil Manthorp Cricket Gary Kirsten-baiting season is back. It’s a national cricket lovers’ pastime that stems from an understandable desire to have Lance Klusener batting everywhere from one to nine and to have Nantie Hayward (or whoever else is flavour of the month) bowling from both ends. Paying spectators have paid for the right to […]

David Le Page and Khadija Magardie Extraordinary powers to tap cellphone calls and Internet communications are on the way for South Africa’s security services following proposals by the South African Law Commission to amend bugging legislation. Among the proposals are: l Forcing cellular networks to purchase extremely expensive monitoring equipment l Establishing permanent centralised monitoring […]