Marked for Thabiso Monyane
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad19 Oct 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Muhammad Bower is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Lebohang Maboe was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Thabiso Monyane and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match17 Oct 2026
University of Pretoria left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“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.
Boardroom19 Oct 2026
Nobody left the Kaizer Chiefs dressing room in a hurry
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 dugout19 Oct 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Pule Mmodi 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 Pule Mmodi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad19 Oct 2026
The first one is the one every signing is asked about until it arrives. It has arrived, and he can stop being asked.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad21 Sep 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 Kaizer Chiefs this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match19 Sep 2026
SuperSport United left with the points after a 0‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Kaizer Chiefs training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mfundo Vilakazi 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.
Market21 Sep 2026
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Mduduzi Shabalala has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Kaizer Chiefs.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Thabiso Monyane
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
Market21 Sep 2026
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Mfundo Vilakazi may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match29 Aug 2026
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 4‑1 against Golden Arrows, and it could have been more.
Market31 Aug 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Kaizer Chiefs can pretend not to have heard.
Market31 Aug 2026
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Kaizer Chiefs people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
A brace, and Pule Mmodi takes the afternoon — 7.89
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Pule Mmodi provided it, and the 7.89 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The terraces31 Aug 2026
Supporters turn on the $510.0K sale of Donay Jansen
He is going to Maritzburg United, the club has $510.0K it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Age has not caught Gastón Sirino yet — 8.06
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.06 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Match29 Aug 2026
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Kaizer Chiefs have 4 straight wins of it.
Market31 Aug 2026
Enyimba come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Kaizer Chiefs did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market31 Aug 2026
Maritzburg United pay $510.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad17 Aug 2026
Sibongiseni Mthethwa 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Kaizer Chiefs training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lebohang Maboe 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.
Match15 Aug 2026
It finished 1‑0, and it was Thabo Cele’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Kaizer Chiefs.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Thabo Cele was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.33. 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
100 games in these colours. Service of that kind gets rarer every season, and the crowd knows it.
Squad17 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ronwen Williams and Kaizer Chiefs agree another 3 years.
The dugout17 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Bradley Phiri kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
The dugout17 Aug 2026
Nobody at Kaizer Chiefs 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.