Our lost treasure – ‘The Puma Stadium’

Witbank Stadium formally known as the Puma Stadium has so many memories.

The stadium.

Witbank Stadium formally known as the Puma Stadium has so many memories hidden behind the damage we see now.

The neglected sports stadium was in recent years home to Mpumalanga Pumas rugby and the Mpumalanga Black Aces FC before both franchises adopted the Mbombela Stadium in Nelspruit.

Witbank Stadium was previously known as the Johann van Riebeeck Stadium until 2000 before new sponsorship deals changed the name to @lantic Park and Witbank Mica Stadium. When the deals with the sponsorships ended, it was known as the famous Puma Stadium, now currently Witbank Stadium.

The stadium is definitely a great historical landmark for eMalahleni and saw some great historic events and moments where supporters cheered on while standing behind their small braai’s. Some historic moments go way back to June 4, 1983, and will probably always be recorded as the greatest in rugby history. The Suidoos-Transvaal rugby team achieved their most glorious victory over a very strong WP team. They won WP 24-19 in a match in the Lion Cup series.

In 1997 the British and Irish Lions visited eMalahleni to beat Suidoos-Transvaal 64-14.

The last international rugby game played at the stadium was on June 19, 2010, when South Africa hosted Italy. South Africa won the game 29-13 with Morné Steyn contributing 14 of the points in that game.

The stadium is currently in use by many local soccer teams such as Witbank Spurs. “The state of the stadium is very bad, we want it to be attractive to gather more future spectators to our games,” said Musa Mthiyane, a Witbank Spurs player.

Lebohang Mofokeng, Manager of Communications for Emalahleni Local Municipality was asked about the bad shape the stadium is in and if there are any future plans in restoring the arena. He said: “The recent IDP Indaba resolved under the unfunded budget to approach business sectors to partner with the municipality in raising R15m to refurbish the stadium. These are the projects that need to be attended to but there is no budget, and therefore we are looking for a good samaritan to fund them.”

Witbank Stadium is now the home to our soccer teams and should be taken care of to create new history for the next generation to come.