Nobela All Stars were lucky to escape with a 1-all draw in their Vodacom Limpopo League match against Basel FC at the Lesley Manyathela Stadium in Musina on Saturday.

Basel enjoyed more ball possession, but their promising moves were turned into a disappointment by the rock-solid defence of Stars. No goals were seen during the first half. This trend continued in the second half and was influenced mainly by the fact that Stars were cooling the ball down in the middle of the park, thus giving their opponents no chance to do as they pleased as was the case in the first half.

Although two of their key players went into the referee's book, Basel continued to fight as an organised team. The two players who were cautioned with cards for rough tackling were Gift Ramaxwaila and Matodzi Dzhabuli.

The visiting side came close to scoring in the 35th minute. The assistant referee kept his flag down at a time when everyone was convinced that Maringa Netshiendeulu would have scored after he had beaten goalkeeper Harold Ndlovu and was left with the empty net, but his shot missed the pole by an inch.

Basel came back strongly in the last half. They continued to mount pressure on the defence of the local lads. They were the first to draw blood in the 60th minute after a defender of the home team, Daveny Howani, handled the ball in his penalty area and the referee pointed to the white spot. Lowis Chauke converted this penalty into a goal.

After the goal, Stars replaced Vusimusi Phiri and Malesa Moshoto with Rhulani Manganye and Foster Baloyi respectively later in the game. This proved to be a clever move on the part of the Stars' technical side. Their long-awaited goal came in the 88th minute when Cebo "Jomo" Masena dribbled past two defenders in a row and passed the ball to his teammate, Malesa Moshoto. He was brought down inside the penalty area and the referee pointed to the penalty mark. Thembisani Nevhulamba equalised from the spot.