Cash strapped teams in the top flight league have described Kuku Matches offer to sponsor football in the country as a big joke.

Kuku Matches last year made a public invitation to clubs to submit their bids for sponsorship. Although Blantyre United applied for the sponsorship, Kuku has been playing games ever since.

At first they said they would sponsor the team that submitted a credible proposal. Blantyre United was the only club that submitted but the company then changed its tune, saying they would wait for other clubs.

But no other club submitted a fresh bid, leading to the suspension of the bid, saying they would select the beneficiary next year.

When interviewed on Thursday, Kuku Matches Director Hassan Jussab said the process was suspended because the clubs that submitted did so after the expiry date.

"The clubs didn't come forward and even the one that submitted (Blantyre United) did so after the expiry date. So we suspended the process until next year," he said.

However, Blantyre United coach Elea Kananji disputed Jussab's statement.

"We submitted the bid, they acknowledged it and even invited our technical director Mr Nakoma for meetings to agree terms but they just changed their tune. They said they wanted more clubs to submit, hence they would suspend the process until next year.

"We were surprised because our proposal outlined everything they wanted. Now we are beginning to think they wasted our time and resources in preparing the proposal because they are just playing games with us," he said.

Other football pundits suggested the reason Blantyre United was not considered is because Jussab wanted Bullets to bid because of his connections with the people's team.

However, Bullets Chairperson Malinda Chinyama said they never considered bidding for the sponsorship and described Kuku Matches as a big joke because they are not honest and appear not knowledgeable enough about the drill of sponsoring a club.

Chinyama said they already dealt with Jussab and were disappointed.

"Immediately after we were elected to power as the new executive we approached Kuku Matches and thought it would be smooth considering Jussab's connection with Bullets but we were shocked that although in the press it was claimed their sponsorship was worth K20 million, we were offered K6 million.

"However when we sat down as executive we said half loaf is better than none so we decided to get the K6 million with the idea of investing it so that it can multiply but when we went to him the following day he changed tune," he said.

The Bullets chair said Jussab suggested that after meeting his advisors, he had decided to make a trial advert of the sponsorship to find out if it would help to market his products.

"He said there was need for him to make a trial run for three weeks during which he would use the Bullets name to advertise his merchandise and that if it would impact positively on the products he would go ahead and give the K6 million but if not then he would not give the money.

"We told him there was no need for a trial run because Bullets, being the people's team, is a crowd puller. We found it funny that he wanted to use the name of Bullets during the trial run without paying anything. Besides the deal he was suggesting was very meagre.

"He suggested for every carton of matches sold we would be getting K100 which was the biggest joke of all. So when I read in the paper stories about Kuku Matches sponsoring a team I just laugh. In fact, you can tell Jussab that I said his sponsorship offer is a joke and an insult to football officials who are trying hard to get sponsorship," he said.