BLOEMFONTEIN – The Central University of Technology (CUT), Free State’s Bloemfontein campus women’s team has renewed its ambitious bid for promotion to the Super League, South Africa’s senior division. This comes after they qualified for this year’s national promotion play-offs, set to take place from 8 to 14 December at the Vaal University of Technology (VUT) in Gauteng.
This will be the university club’s second attempt at promotion to the top league, following the first in 2022. The team claimed victory in the Free State stream of the Sasol Women’s League to secure a slot in the national promotion play-offs. The CUT team beat Napoli FC 5 − 0 in a championship decider played on 16 November at the Clive Solomon Stadium.
The national promotion play-offs, staged under the auspices of Safa, feature the nine winners of the respective provinces. Only two of these nine clubs get promotion to the senior rank.
Achieving promotion is a tough task for the team’s head coach, Lefu Mohapi, and his technical team. They are hoping for an improved performance to make up for their previous unsuccessful attempt. Promotion is the ultimate prize for the team; a Free State team has yet to gain promotion to the Super League.
Last year, the team of the University of the Free State (UFS) also failed at that gate of glory. The CUT ladies (Ixias) look fill the void that followed the sale of the Bloemfontein Celtic women’s franchise to Durban-based businesswoman Shauwn Mkhize. She also purchased the Celtic men’s franchise in 2021.
