By Mark Gleeson BBC Sport Online in Cape Town

Officials of the South African Premier League are set to reveal plans to cut the country's premier soccer league by two clubs, just days before the kick off of the new season.

The league will be reduced from 18 to 16 by buying out the franchises of two of the existing clubs, officials said on Sunday.

The two sides are not yet known but a pay-out of between $400,000 to $800,000 each has been mentioned.

Media speculation over their identity continues but clubs and league officials are refusing to name any possible candidates.

The long-standing proposal to reduce the size of the league was accepted at a meeting of the club's representatives in Johannesburg last week but the final details were still being thrashed out over the weekend.

The proposal, made by South African Football Association (Safa) chief executive officer Danny Jordaan, said the league needed cutting because of fixture congestion and a decline in income for the country's professional clubs.

Attendances have been falling steadily for years, although exact numbers are not available because the league does not issue figures.

Expenditure on salaries and transfer fees, plus a rise in transport costs, has also increased dramatically, fast catching up with revenue from sponsorship and television rights.

The space created in the calendar by cutting numbers would also allow more matches for South Africa's national team, the major source of revenue for Safa.