Pule, Patrick ‘Ace’ Ntsoelengoe, unanimously acclaimed as one of South Africa’s greatest soccer players, died on Monday at the age of 50.
The shock reverberated round the country, with a pall of gloom and sadness cast over Kaizer Chiefs, the club with whom he was most widely associated during an
illustrious and varied career.
The Chiefs’ website said the club had received a call from one of their supporters who said he had discovered Ntsoelengoe slumped in his car at a hotel in Lenasia.
A police spokesperson confirmed Ntsoelengoe’s death and said forensic evidence was being gathered in an ongoing investigation.
Ntsoelengoe has mainly been associated with youth development coaching at Chiefs since his retirement as a player more than a decade ago and was with Amakhosi’s under-15 team that beat Arcadia 5-0 at the Caledonian Ground in Pretoria less than 24 hours before his death.
Quiet, unassuming and always obliging off the pitch, Ntsoelengoe was acclaimed a ”midfielder supreme”.
He was robbed of acclaim in the international arena because of South Africa’s expulsion and banishment by Fifa as a result of the country’s apartheid doctrine, but his prowess was demonstrated with various clubs in the United States over a period of a dozen or more years.
He was inducted into the United States Soccer Hall of fame after his retirement.
Kaizer Chiefs managing director Kaizer Motaung, a contemporary of Ntsoelengoe in the Amakhosi line-up alongside players like Computer Lamola, Teenage Dlalda, Jan Lechaba, Shaka Ngcobo, Peta Bala’c and Jingles Perreira, said the he was idolised by his opponents and supporters.
”He had the ability to turn a game with one moment of brilliance,” said Motaung, ”and his subtle skills were incomparable in this country.
”We pour out our condolences to his family and to those who grew to know and love him,” said the Chiefs’ supremo, ” relatives, sportsmen and supporters alike”. – Sapa