Marked for Sifiso Grobler
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad28 Dec 2026
64 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Muranga Seal lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad28 Dec 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Muranga Seal this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Dec 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Sifiso Grobler and Muranga Seal agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dennis Munyovi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to John Owira, and the manager let it.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
Lucas Maina knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Muranga Seal, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market3 Aug 2026
Portsmouth come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Ajax Cape Town did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Erick Phiri in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ajax Cape Town this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Ajax Cape Town training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dean Dala 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.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Market3 Aug 2026
Add another name to the list: Hearts of Oak have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Hlompho Dala. The answer from Ajax Cape Town has not changed — yet.
Squad3 Aug 2026
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.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
Kaizer Chiefs have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
A loan move for Matías Córdoba is in the works
Ajax Cape Town have made the call to Colón. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
The dugout3 Aug 2026
Erick Phiri knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Erick Phiri trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.