Bafana missed training because ‘Safa did not book stadium’: SMSA

Bafana Bafana's camp for their friendlies against Sierra Leone and Botswana got off to a poor start when they could not train at Dobsonville Stadium on Monday, with Stadium Management SA (SMSA) saying it was because the SA Football Association (Safa) did not book the venue.

Bafana meet Sierra Leone on Saturday and Botswana on Tuesday, both at FNB Stadium.

Coach Hugo Broos was left frustrated when the national team could not train at Dobsonville Stadium.

“I didn’t know we couldn’t train on the pitch today. If you ask me where are we going to train, I can’t answer you because we didn't do it [Bafana did not get the arrangements wrong]," Broos said as SA held a press conference at Dobsonville Stadium on Monday.

Apparently Safa officials were supposed to book the ground with SMSA. TimesLIVE was told Bafana team manager Vincent Tseka was ultimately responsible and slipped up by not carrying out that duty.

Safa CEO Tebogo Motlanthe denied it was Safa's slip-up and claimed the national team did hold a training session.

“No, Bafana trained yesterday [Monday],” Motlanthe said.

However, two Safa officials who did not want to be named told TimesLIVE Bafana didn’t train on Monday. While one source put the blame on Safa, the other shifted the blame to SMSA, saying the stadium wasn’t ready for a training session.

SMSA managing director Bertie Grobbelaar confirmed the stadium was not ready, but said that was because Safa had not booked a training session at the ground for Monday.

“Bafana booked Dobsonville on September 8 for the following training sessions: on September 20 [Tuesday] at 10 am and 4pm, September 21 [Wednesday] at 3pm and September 22 [Thursday] at 10am and 4pm,” Grobbelaar said.

“There was no training session booked for yesterday [Monday].”

“I see there is a [media] report that there was something wrong with the pitch. There was nothing wrong with the pitch. The stadium wasn’t booked.”

Grobbelaar said Safa only booked to hold the press conference at Dobsonville two hours before Monday's media briefing started.

“Safa requested a press conference for 3pm very late yesterday, which I approved. The request for the press conference came at 1pm. But the pitch wasn’t marked because the training session was today [Tuesday],” Grobbelaar said.

“You need to book well in advance, although we will do anything in our power to assist Safa because we are partners with them. Bafana are our national team and we will go out of our way, but we’ve got four stadiums to manage.

“There are other events at stadiums we need to coordinate. There are plans with our pitch guys.”

Attempts to get reach of Tseka for comment were unsuccessful.