Two goals and a mark of 8.43 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The name of Itumeleng Tau has come up in conversations Black Aces were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Beaten 8 times, with 3 saves for company. Goalkeepers carry these scorelines on their record whoever actually caused them, which is the quiet injustice of the job.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Black Aces this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
10 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Black Aces and Platinum Stars in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
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.
Elliot Seema 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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Words at Black Aces training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bradley Mokotjo 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 23 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Cebisa Ndlovu will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Black Aces the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Black Aces this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
31 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Black Aces lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Two goals and a mark of 9.01 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Black Aces this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Player ratings20 Dec 2027
Bradley Mokotjo was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.26. 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Black Aces they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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.
Dean Modiba 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.
Whether it was the goalkeeper or the ten in front of him is the argument that will fill every conversation in town this week. 5 saves does not settle it either way.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Black Aces this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
10 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Black Aces and Free State Stars in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Words at Black Aces training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bradley Mokotjo 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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Bradley Williams and Black Aces agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Bradley Mokotjo signs something — a contract at Black Aces or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
BoardroomBlack Aces sign a deal worth $138.0K a year
26 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Black Aces lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Mpho Chabatsane 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.
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Dean Modiba 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 is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Black Aces told Gift Dala something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
72 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Black Aces lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Two goals and a mark of 8.62 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. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Thamsanqa Billiat did not need any: 7.81, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Mpho Chabatsane 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.
102 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Black Aces lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Cebisa Ndlovu is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Black Aces this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Thato Mokeke damages knee ligaments — 110 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 110 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.
A mark of 7.66 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.01 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Black Aces can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Black Aces is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Boardroom9 Aug 2027
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Black Aces
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
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.
Erick 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Ajax Cape Town paid $300.0K and Black Aces took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
In brief
SquadBradley Mokotjo falls out with a teammate over standards
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 17 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Position 3, 33 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Percy Mokotjo 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.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Words at Black Aces training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bradley Mokotjo 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.