Stuart Baxter hopes the arbitrator will rule in Kaizer Chiefs’ favour

Johannesburg – Kaizer Chiefs’ coach Stuart Baxter says he hopes that the decision that will be made by the independent arbitrator will allow the team to play the matches that they forfeited amid the Covid-19 outbreak at their base in Naturena early December.

After failing to honour two of their five league matches in December during the outbreak, Amakhosi were found guilty by the PSL's Disciplinary Committee. But they appealed, pleading for the case to go for arbitration.

The DC compiled, with the league and Amakhosi asked to find an arbitrator on Monday. Reports emerged that they both nominated the name of Nassir Cassim, the advocate who handled the arbitration of the “Tendai Ndoro saga” in 2018.

But in the meantime, there are more chances that the DC’s decision to find Chiefs guilty will stand, given that the Board of Governors, the 32 club owners in the PSL, agreed that matches should be played despite any rising Covid-19 complications.

But with leagues such as the English Premier League having been flexible to alter that agreement and allow matches to be postponed, Baxter is hoping that the Cassim could take a leaf out from the same book when he hands down his verdict.

“Global football has been suffering. What I would say is that many leagues have been learning this as they are going along. They’ve made a ruling and they’ve realised that we’ve got to be more flexible than that,” Baxter said this week.

“I would just hope - although I realise there’s arbitration and all these things and I can’t say much - that would be what comes out this year. So, that we can move along with the knowledge that we have with the situation (and its challenges).

“I don’t think there’s anybody in the Premier League that has had near what