Broos still learning hard truth about mistrust in SA football

TRUST is a rare commodity in South African football. When you have been in the game long enough, you know that backstabbing is par for the course. And it happens all round, often within the same club.

- MATSHELANE MAMABOLO

Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos appears to have discovered this for the first time this week.

At his arrival press conference ahead of the Fifa World Cup qualifiers against Lesotho and Nigeria, the Belgian resembled a man who had just seen a ghost when he spoke about the lack of information from the clubs.

Having worked hard to develop a relationship with them, the silver-haired coach was stunned by the response he received from one club when he enquired about the condition of a player he was interested in.

“Their reaction was, ‘we don’t want the opponents to know he is playing’,” Broos said, deep inside the bowels of Dobsonville Stadium.

To say he epitomised the word flabbergasted would be putting it mildly.

“But I will never call the opponents,” he added, clearly finding the insinuation that he might do so absurd.