Sundowns coach Mngqithi discloses meeting with Bafana’s Broos at Chloorkop

Mamelodi Sundowns coach Manqoba Mngqithi and his Bafana Bafana counterpart Hugo Broos will meet at Chloorkop on Sunday in a bid to end their war of words and “try to find each other”. 

Over the past few weeks, Mngqithi and Broos have been engaged in a public verbal altercation regarding defender Khuliso Mudau and midfielder Teboho Mokoena. 

Mudau and Mokoena, who are key players for Bafana and Sundowns, have tasted little action recently and an unimpressed Broos questioned why they have not been playing at their club. 

In a strong response, Mngqithi last week called on Broos to focus on his job with the national team and stop interfering with what he is doing at Chloorkop, but made it clear he was open for a meeting. 

“With regards to coach Broos and my utterances, we will be having a meeting with him tomorrow [on Sunday] at Chloorkop,” Mngqithi said after his team thrashed Lamontville Golden Arrows 5-0 in the Carling Knockout Cup at Lucas Moripe Stadium on Saturday night. 

The core of Broos' Bafana combination is made up of Sundowns players including Ronwen Williams, Grant Kekana, Aubrey Modiba, Themba Zwane, Iqraam Rayners and Thapelo Morena, Mudau and Mokoena. 

The national coach has also used Mothobi Mvala and Thapelo Maseko when they have been fit. Bathusi Aubaas came into Broos' starting XI after some injuries as South Africa put themselves on the verge of qualification for the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations with a 5-0 at home win and 1-1 draw away against Congo this month.

Mngqithi said good relations between Sundowns and Bafana are important because Broos works with so many Sundowns players. 

“I think we will move forward in creating a better environment because he’s got a lot of our players. We support the national team and Safa [the South African Football Association] because even with the junior national teams we have a lot of players there.

“It is only proper for us as coaches or as leaders of these institutions to try to find each other. We must be able to communicate about these things. It is only for the best because you may find that there are other players that he might not have looked at closely. 

“But when we communicate and he gets to know what I feel about those individuals it makes his life easy. I believe he has a big pool of players he can get from us and all these clubs, but without good relations with the coaches it makes it difficult to even assist where we can assist.” 

Sundowns made Siyabonga Mabena and Kutlwano Letlhaku available for Amajita at the recent Cosafa U-20 Championships in Mozambique, and they helped South Africa qualify for the Caf U-20 Africa Cup of Nations. 

Broos has been trying to set up a meeting with all the Premiership coaches at the same time since his appointment in May 2021 but his attempts to do this via the Premier Soccer League have been unsuccessful.

A more sensible approach might be to simply meet all the coaches individually, as he is now doing with Mngqithi.

The coach regularly used to have spats via the media with Mngqithi's predecessor, Rulani Mokwena and better channels of communication would have been deemed beneficial to both coaches at the time.