This year's silly season has entered into its last month, and even though there have been a number of movements so far in the PSL, one club don't look like their spending spree is going to hold up.
Mamelodi Sundowns have already officially confirmed the signings of around 10 new players, with a whole host of other names thought to have concluded deals at Chloorkop without confirmation just yet.
I can't really get my head round it all to be honest. Mamelodi Sundowns had a big squad as it is, now they're bringing in a whole bunch of new faces, from all over Africa, and will probably be able to field about four 11-man teams with the players that Pitso Mosimane will have at his disposal this campaign.
I understand that last season's performance was unacceptable for the Brazilians. A team of their quality should never have finished in the position where they ended up. However, will signing everyone with a pulse help improve things at Chloorkop? I'm not so sure…
This situation reminds me of the Inter Milan of old. In the 60s they were renowned for signing for the sake of signing. Making big-money moves for players that would never play, purely so that their rivals couldn't have them. Sound familiar?
There are a number of talented young South Africans that have joined Msandawana, in this window and previously, who are likely to never reach their potential due to the sheer size of the Sundowns team.
It's no secret, on Twitter I regularly get tweets after a player joins Sundowns saying. "That's another career gone". I know I'm not the only one that thinks this way.
I just can't understand what Downs plan to do with all these players this season, surely a number of them are going to be unhappy, and an unhappy camp rarely produces the goods on the field of play.
I work in football every day, I live and breathe the stuff, but I couldn't tell you which starting XI Pitso will start with on a weekly basis. I couldn't even tell you which goalkeeper he was going to go with! You have Bafana's number three, Wayne Sandilands, who has been a reliable rearguard for the defence for ages, now battling it out with Zambian number one, Kennedy Mweene. Then you've also got Belgian, Glenn Verbauwhede, and South African Thela Ngobeni, who are unlikely to even make the bench.
It really makes me wonder how many of the players that Sundowns have signed have been brought on board because of their talent, or whether it was simply a middle-finger to whichever other club had been vying for his signature.
I think this season could go one of two ways for Pitso Mosimane's Mamelodi Sundowns. On one hand I could be completely wrong, the team may gel perfectly and 'Jingles' may have turned the corner with them and lead them to silverware.
Credit to them, they've started well. A 3-1 win away at Bloemfontein Celtic is an impressive result and they looked sharp, but we are just one game in after all. Their first game of last season saw them hammer Chiefs and look what happened after that.
For that reason, on the other side of the coin, the irrational signings of all and sundry could disrupt the team even more, condemning them to a season much similar to the disappointment of their 2012/13 campaign.
It seems that not even the sky is their limit…
Yours in football, Joe
Soccer-Laduma journalist
Follow Joe on Twitter: @YesWeCrann
