Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Mamelodi Sundowns will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
198 appearances across 8 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Ronwen Williams and Mamelodi Sundowns agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mamelodi Sundowns this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I did not go to AFC Leopards to sit and watch. I want to come back to Mamelodi Sundowns and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 6 matches say the rest.
The loan was meant to give him football. 0 games and 0 goals later he is back at Mamelodi Sundowns no further forward, and everybody involved will explain why it was not their doing.
“For the first time in years I am picked because somebody wants me in the team.” Maritzburg United suits him; the awkward conversation belongs to Mamelodi Sundowns, and the summer will force it.
5 goals in 26 games at ASO Chlef — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Mamelodi Sundowns updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 155 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The offer from Bloemfontein Celtic for Arthur Sales 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.
Player ratings1 Feb 2027
A first appearance Thato Moalusi will want to forget — 5.57
Everybody's debut is one of two stories and this was the other one. 5.57, and the only consolation available is that nobody's career has ever been decided by ninety minutes in a shirt he had just been given.
Ronwen Williams 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.
Add another name to the list: Gor Mahia have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Thato Moalusi. The answer from Mamelodi Sundowns has not changed — yet.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fawaaz Basadien 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.
4‑1, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Player ratings4 Jan 2027
A brace, and Nuno Santos takes the afternoon — 8.73
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Nuno Santos provided it, and the 8.73 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 37 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.79 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
The offer from Paradou for Keanu Cupido 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.
Ronwen Williams 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.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Mamelodi Sundowns will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Lwandiso Radebe is 17, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Add another name to the list: Jomo Cosmos have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Khulumani Ndamane. The answer from Mamelodi Sundowns has not changed — yet.
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Free State Stars has to find a result from somewhere.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Free State Stars have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Free State Stars 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 words a physio says slowly. 17 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Ronwen Williams 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.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Player ratings7 Dec 2026
Nuno Santos was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.71. 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Thapelo Morena 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.
In brief
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Jayden Adams at his very best
59 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Mamelodi Sundowns lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Themba Zwane 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.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Mamelodi Sundowns hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
“I did not go to Free State Stars to sit and watch. I want to come back to Mamelodi Sundowns and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 11 matches say the rest.