Sometimes changing a soccer coach can result in a miraculous change in fortunes. Take, for example, what has happened at Tottenham Hotspur since the affable Harry Redknapp took over.
And, not for the first time, Sundowns’ billionaire owner and president, Patrice Motsepe, will be looking for something similar after announcing on Friday that French coach Henri Michel had been granted a work permit and would take over the reins from Trott Moloto for Sunday’s Premier League game against Thanda Royal Zulu at the Super Stadium.
So far, the changes at the helm of Sundowns’ coaching staff have produced nothing resembling a miracle, with the skeletons of speedily hired-and-fired Sundowns coaches littering the club’s Chloorkop headquarters.
Michel, the former national coach of France, Tunisia and Côte d’Ivoire, has brought fitness trainer Florent Motta, as well as high expectations.
But the French coach’s recent positions have not set the world on fire.
It has always been Motsepe’s assumption that coach’s must produce the goods or suffer the consequences — and for the vast majority of coaches, it has been a case of the latter. Which prompts the question: If all the Sundowns coaches have been flops, who appointed them?
After all the furore over Bafana Bafana coach Joel Santana’s lack of English, it would not be presumptuous to expect Michel and Motta to be reasonably proficient in the Queen’s English.
Yet South African soccer abounds in paradoxes. Take this weekend’s fixtures. All the talk and unbridled excitement revolves once more around Saturday afternoon’s derby between Orlando Pirates and Kaizer Chiefs at what is certain to be a jam-packed Mmabatho Stadium.
Meanwhile, defending champions SuperSport United will be up against current log leaders Bidvest Wits University at the Super Stadium on Saturday night in what is expected to be the most significant encounter of the weekend’s PSL programme.
But, in all likelihood, the game between these two frontrunners will attract little more than a man and his dog.
All in all, the PSL title race is evolving into an intriguing, unpredictable confrontation in which more than half the clubs in the log are involved.
The sprightly Golden Arrows, placed second and the only unbeaten team in the championship race, will have their mettle tested by Moroka Swallows at Olympia Park on Sunday. – Sapa