How we beat the big guns - Ria tells all

Ria Stars' managing director Ria Ledwaba on Tuesday revealed details of an aggressive marketing campaign that saw her unfashionable club pip many bigger names for a spot in Saturday's Telkom Charity Cup at the FNB Stadium.

Ledwaba attributed Stars' success to "Operation Manyesa", which, she explained, was not like those clandestine operations used to destabilise neighbouring countries by the previous government.

"It was an aggressive marketing campaign that involved canvassing support from almost everyone around the Northern Province, personally urging them to vote for Ria Stars," said Ledwaba.

"There was no magic formula involved nor any hanky panky as such. We just didn't rely on the radio, television or the media.

"We went out to the people, to the taxi ranks, mobilised taxi drivers and urged them to do it for Manyora.

"We held discussions with the provincial government, the chamber of commerce, the mines; went to super markets, the University of the North, and other civic and community organisations around the province to rally support.

"I agree that we cannot match both Kaizer Chiefs and Pirates in terms of support. But the Telkom Charity is all about voting and how many people have, at the end of the day, managed to cast their votes for you.

"We didn't sit on our laurels and assumed that people would vote for us. We knew we faced an uphill battle considering the kind of support commanded by Gauteng teams. But we proved that with a little hard work, it can be done."

It is not the first time that a team from the Northern Province has qualified for the cup after Real Rovers did the same in 1995.

Meanwhile, musicians Arthur and his All Stars, Ishmael and the Ladysmith Black Mambazo will perform at the event on Saturday.

The organisers of the event managed to raise close to R250 000 from telephone votes lodged by soccer followers naming the four teams they wanted to take part in the tournament.

Ed Tillett, Telkom's media relations manager who helped monitor the vote lines and, after closing date, submitted the votes to Delloite and Touche for auditing, disclosed yesterday that there was a total of 206 503 calls made.

Tillett also explained that it was difficult at this stage to announce the exact figure raised due to the fact that even though standard calls were charged at 58 cents a minute, the charges also depended on the time a call was made and the distance from where it was made.

"A large percentage of the amount raised will be donated to charitable organisations," he said. "But it will take a while longer before we are certain how much was raised as everything still has to be audited," he added.

The "appearance fee" for the winning team will be R150 000. The runners-up will get R110 000 and the remaining two teams will receive R60 000 each.

For the record, Stars registered 52 861 votes to finish top ahead of Orlando Pirates, Kaizer Chiefs and Moroka Swallows.

Pirates finished second with 35 217, Chiefs were third on 34 599, Swallows fourth with 33 760 while Sundowns fell 212 votes short of securing a spot.

- The PSL announced on Tuesday that they had swopped the times for the semifinal clashes for crowd-control reasons.

Stars will now meet Swallows in the first semifinal at 10am while Pirates meet Chiefs at midday.