Thanda Royal Zulu FC is a registered football club in the Premier Soccer League (PSL) based at the new uMhlathuze Sports Stadium in Richards’ Bay. The name of the club is under license agreement with the Zulu King, His Majesty King Zwelitini Goodwill kaBhekuzulu.
This unique relationship with the Zulu Monarch and Zulu nation is entrenched, not only in the form of a license agreement, but through the active and committed support of the King himself and the Zulu Nation who seem to regard the club as the club most likely to rise to the top of the league and represent KwaZulu-Natal as the team of choice for the province and the Zulu Nation. The only other team that presently enjoys some of this status is AmaZulu FC, a successful Premier Division Club which is based in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal. Its owners are also close friends with the Zulu King.
Zululand has never had a PSL team based within the area, the closest being Durban. This has always been the unfortunate legacy of Zululand: that clubs have tended to stick to the cities.
However, the construction and completion of the uMhlathuze Sport Complex just before the World Cup changed everything. Built for the purpose of encouraging sport development within the region, the uMhlathuze Sports Complex and new Richards Bay Stadium, provides excellent facilities and amenities for a PSL team such as Thanda Royal Zulu FC.
uThungulu District Municipality, which oversaw the construction and completion of the stadium, along with uMhlathuze Municipality must be complimented for the world-class standard of what had been achieved. The Nigerian team that was based in Richards Bay during the World Cup, commented on the top standard of the pitch and change rooms and caused quite a stir when they refused to be based in Ballito where FIFA invested millions for their training facilities and accommodation. Richards Bay provided an excellent base and by all accounts, the players, management and technical staff were very satisfied with the whole operation.
The decision to move the club and team to Richards Bay was largely due to the involvement and influence of the clubs Managing Director and Chairman, Pierre Delvaux who recently took the club over after a continued period when the shareholding of the club was undecided after a BEE consortium failed to come up with the necessary funding to take the club over from the Swedes who exited and sold the club in July 2009.
For many years, talented youngsters with great potential have been recruited from Zululand to play in clubs around the country and abroad. The list of well known successful players is endless.
Now for the first time, the opportunity exists for this amazing reservoir of talent to play for a local club, thus inspiring the youth of Zululand to go for their dreams and remain within the region to inspire others as role models.
A very experienced general manager who oversaw the most successful years of one of the largest clubs in Africa, Mamelodi Sundowns, Peter Koutroulis has been appointed to manage the club.
Thanda Royal Zulu FC prides itself in being a well-structured, well-organized business that follows good governance principles, best business practice and goes about its business in a fair, professional and honest manner. The leadership of the Swedish investors must be credited for achieving such high standards and ethics as well as the establishment of a professional operation.
The intention of the club is to build a solid business within Zululand, and then expand to KwaZulu Natal and then into South Africa at a national level. The main goal and objective however, is to obtain promotion from the National First Division with the Premier Soccer League, into the Premier Division of the PSL. Thereafter, the second objective will be to initiate steps to establish a youth academy in Zululand with the goal of building up young promising players that will enable them to compete abroad for some of the top European Clubs and the opportunity to return to South Africa to play for the National team.
