Marked for Nelson Ralenkoane
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match20 Mar 2028
49 points, and the season has a number on it. Whatever it felt like from the inside, this is what it will look like in a book.
Market20 Mar 2028
Fiacre Ntwari hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what SuperSport United can pretend not to have heard.
Market20 Mar 2028
Fiacre Ntwari has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around SuperSport United they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Match18 Mar 2028
No end in sight to SuperSport United's wait for a win
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at SuperSport United has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad20 Mar 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Teboho Mokotjo and SuperSport United agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Lebogang Furman and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Williams Mokoena was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match18 Mar 2028
Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
The dugout20 Mar 2028
“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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market13 Dec 2027
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around SuperSport United they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad13 Dec 2027
The step up is real for Themba Jali
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.
Squad13 Dec 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at SuperSport United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Dec 2027
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Williams Mokoena was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Player ratings13 Dec 2027
7.47, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. SuperSport United had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
The dugout13 Dec 2027
“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.
The dugout13 Dec 2027
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The dugout13 Dec 2027
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Market13 Dec 2027
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad11 Oct 2027
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Williams Mokoena was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad11 Oct 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at SuperSport United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Oct 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Nelson Ralenkoane and SuperSport United agree another 3 years.
Market11 Oct 2027
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
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 Keagan Mahlangu is on it.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
Ayyoub asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Market11 Oct 2027
The clock does Ayyoub’s negotiating for him
4 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee SuperSport United could ask drops and the wages Ayyoub can ask rise.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad16 Aug 2027
40 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. SuperSport United lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Market16 Aug 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what SuperSport United can pretend not to have heard.
Squad16 Aug 2027
8 saves, and a scoreline the ten men in front of him had no right to. Goalkeepers only get noticed on the bad days; this was one of the other ones.
Transfer targets16 Aug 2027
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.
Market16 Aug 2027
The bid was some way short and SuperSport United did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Williams Mokoena was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad16 Aug 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Dean Jali and SuperSport United agree another 3 years.
Player ratings16 Aug 2027
Successful dribbles: 15. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Transfer targets16 Aug 2027
SuperSport United have made the call to Newell's Old Boys. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad9 Aug 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Ethen Sampson
47 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. SuperSport United lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market9 Aug 2027
“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 SuperSport United, and it is not being withdrawn.
The dugout9 Aug 2027
Dimpho Madalane: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” SuperSport United have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Boardroom9 Aug 2027
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $253.0K — a club that wants Akhanyisile Sinoti enough to be asked twice.
Boardroom9 Aug 2027
A new deal for the man in the dugout, and the clearest thing a board can say without calling a press conference about it. Stability is cheap to promise and expensive to deliver.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Lebogang Furman 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.
Transfer targets9 Aug 2027
$230.0K was the most the club would pay and Chippa United were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Boardroom9 Aug 2027
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Words at SuperSport United training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Williams Mokoena 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad29 Mar 2027
The medical room confirms 19 days on the sidelines for Erick Hlatshwayo, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Williams Mokoena was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Happy Mashiane and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout29 Mar 2027
Teboho Mkhize has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at SuperSport United will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout29 Mar 2027
“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.
Market29 Mar 2027
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Williams Mokoena signs something — a contract at SuperSport United or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The dugout29 Mar 2027
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at SuperSport United, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The dugout29 Mar 2027
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
Market29 Mar 2027
SuperSport United have let the market know Siyabonga Dala can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Deadline passes with 6 signed and 1 gone
That is the business done at SuperSport United 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Nelson Ralenkoane has just signed for SuperSport United, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Lebogang Furman 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Williams Mokoena was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout1 Feb 2027
The manager makes an example of Lebogang Furman
“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.
Match30 Jan 2027
Platinum Stars left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad1 Feb 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Nelson Ralenkoane and SuperSport United agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout1 Feb 2027
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Luther Erasmus after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Market1 Feb 2027
He is 19, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.