6 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.
Player ratings28 Dec 2026
Mpho Padime, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.95
A mark of 7.95 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. May Mahlangu 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.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 91. Kaizer Chiefs had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
Mothobi Mvala is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
4 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.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Free State Stars can tell you which week it ends in.
Thabiso Lebitso 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Andile Hlatshwayo after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Orlando Pirates in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Free State Stars know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody at Free State Stars is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
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.
5 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Polokwane City were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Mothobi Mvala. 1‑0 against Polokwane City, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Marked 6.64 on 11 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
Thabiso Lebitso 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and May Mahlangu was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
11 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Gopolang Taunyane is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Thabiso Lebitso 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. May Mahlangu 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 is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Something was said to Lwanda Mbanjwa and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. SuperSport United defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Erick Tau 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 door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑4 defeat, delivered by Andile Hlatshwayo to a room that had heard them before.
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Beaten 4 times, 1 saves, and an afternoon that will go on his record whether it was his fault or the defence’s. It is the quiet unfairness of the position.
Lwanda Mbanjwa is 20, and for one weekend he was the best of everybody his age in the division. Nobody should build a career on it and everybody quietly does.
Golden Arrows next, and one man in the Free State Stars dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
28 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Free State Stars lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Chippa United have accepted the money. What Free State Stars do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Sanele Sikhosana has just signed for Free State Stars, and for once the answer mattered.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Free State Stars can pretend not to have heard.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 10 signed and 4 gone
That is the business done at Free State Stars until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $45.0K — a club that wants Lonwabo Magugwana enough to be asked twice.
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.
$44.0K 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.
The name of Themba Grobler has come up in conversations Free State Stars were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
The words a physio says slowly. 44 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.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 85th, and Kaizer Chiefs spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Free State Stars can pretend not to have heard.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Free State Stars have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Everything agreed with Mamelodi Sundowns, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
The phone has started ringing about Thulani Mahlangu again, and this time the name on the line is HB Køge. Free State Stars are listening politely and promising nothing.
In brief
SquadWords at Free State Stars training over how hard people work
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Mamelodi Sundowns people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.27 at 37, 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 7.75 for the rest of it.
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.
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.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and University of Pretoria waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Mamelodi Sundowns is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.17 at 37, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ronwen Williams and Mamelodi Sundowns agree another 2 years.
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
SuperSport United paid $170.0K and Mamelodi Sundowns took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.