The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Chippa United is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Katlego Mohamme and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Chippa United can tell you which week it ends in.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Athini Jodwana and Chippa United agree another 1 years.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Chippa United pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Chippa United told Sabelo Sithole something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout13 Mar 2028
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Teboho Dolly chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
In brief
Looking aheadChippa United take on the side everybody is chasing
The phone has started ringing about Karabo Molefe again, and this time the name on the line is Mamelodi Sundowns. Chippa United are listening politely and promising nothing.
Boardroom7 Feb 2028
Chippa United close the window on a squad of their own making
7 in and 3 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
4 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Katlego Mohamme was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Chippa United, and 5 appearances in 24 say he has earned the hearing.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chippa United will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chippa United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Lwanda Mbanjwa trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
In brief
Player ratingsAn afternoon Sabelo Sithole will want back
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 54 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.29 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.71 for the rest of it.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Chippa United have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Thulani Mabaso has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.21, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Words at Chippa United training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sabelo Sithole is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Chippa United will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Chippa United have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Thulani Mabaso was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Squad25 Oct 2027
5 new faces, and Chippa United are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chippa United will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Ashley Du Preez and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Chippa United ran out of time with Polokwane City. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chippa United will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Two goals and a mark of 8.28 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Sabelo Sithole has, at Chippa United, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
9 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Golden Arrows were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
The shirt still fits. Harold Majadibodu is back at Chippa United, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Bloemfontein Celtic waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Golden Arrows is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Ntandoyenkosi Mabaso has gone, the accounts have $540.0K in them, and the supporters have the feeling of having been sold something themselves. Good business and a good decision are not always the same thing.
The offer from Chippa United for Samkelo Dlamuka was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
$68.0K on the table at Chippa United. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Bidvest Wits paid $540.0K and Golden Arrows took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sbonelo Cele was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Philani Khumalo and Golden Arrows agree another 3 years.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Golden Arrows people have started saying his name in the past tense.
SuperSport United pay $270.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Sbonelo Cele and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
41 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Golden Arrows lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Golden Arrows have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The offer from Bidvest Wits for Angelo Van Rooi was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Simón García falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Golden Arrows this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
48 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Golden Arrows lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Golden Arrows, and it is not being withdrawn.
Sbonelo Cele was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Sazi Gumbi has his answer from Golden Arrows; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Mpendulo Dlamini is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
101 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Golden Arrows lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Sbonelo Cele and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Words at Golden Arrows training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Themba Mantshiyane is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
131 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Golden Arrows lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Black Aces will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Golden Arrows were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 32 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
Marked 7.63 at 18, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Words at Golden Arrows training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Simón García is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
There is a particular helplessness in conceding 2 times before the twentieth minute. Black Aces tried to reorganise, Golden Arrows did not allow it, and the result was written long before it was confirmed.
139 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Golden Arrows lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
12 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Simón García falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Angelo Van Rooi and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Golden Arrows will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Golden Arrows can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Golden Arrows have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Golden Arrows is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Words at Golden Arrows training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Simón García is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Golden Arrows this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 11 combined actions and a mark of 6.87, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Golden Arrows this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Thabo Matlaba was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
8.00. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Ramahlwe Mothiba chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.