“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.
Everything agreed with Golden Arrows, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Bradley Vilakazi is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Black Aces asked and Mamelodi Sundowns said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Words at Black Aces training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Noah Fenyő 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Black Aces know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 23 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Orlando Pirates waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Black Aces is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Rivaldo Kekana will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Black Aces the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Everything agreed with Kaizer Chiefs, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Black Aces will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Bradley Vilakazi is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Kaizer Chiefs have kept their man, and Black Aces go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“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 Black Aces, and it is not being withdrawn.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Black Aces know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“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.
At 20 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
It will be explained as a change for the team and it may even be one. Nobody who has worn one believes that, and neither does the man who has just had it taken away.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Siyabonga Modiba is on it.
Two goals and a mark of 8.88 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.11 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“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 Black Aces, and it is not being withdrawn.
6 matches without a win, and then this, against Free State Stars. Relief is a strange noise in a football ground and it was the only noise at the end.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Dean Mphela 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.
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Williams Mkhize.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Bradley Vilakazi and Black Aces agree another 3 years.
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.
The words a physio says slowly. 48 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 13 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
The deal with Orlando Pirates is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
9 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Black Aces and Bloemfontein Celtic in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
At 19 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
114 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Black Aces lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“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 Black Aces, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two goals and a mark of 8.86 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Itumeleng Dala 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.
A point taken on 87 minutes is worth exactly one point and considerably more than that to a dressing room. This side does not stop, which is a reputation worth more than the result.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Bradley Vilakazi and Black Aces agree another 3 years.
2‑2, 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 manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Ronwen Hlatshwayo was not hiding it after 2‑2, and nobody in the Black Aces dressing room was either.
“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 Black Aces, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 5 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
10 goals in one match, Hlompho Zungu on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Black Aces and Bloemfontein Celtic.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Dean Mphela 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.