Despite Rulani Mokwena's reign as head coach at Mamelodi Sundowns getting off to a perfect, Soccer Laduma can reveal that it's not all rosy behind the scenes.
This publication reported recently that Sundowns have initiated talks to extend Mokwena's contract at the club but the same cannot be said about Manqoba Mngqithi, who was demoted to being a senior coach, with Steve Komphela elevated to an assistant coach.
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As reported in edition 1300 of the newspaper, Mngqithi has not fully embraced the coaching changes at the club and could look turn the page on his coaching career.
It was initially believed that the former Golden Arrows mentor had signed a four-year contract in 2020, which would have seen him still contracted to the club until 2024.
However, Mngqithi's agent Mike Makaab revealed recently on Gagasi FM, where he is a co-host of a bi-weekly Sport show, discussing the the coaching changes at Sundowns that the 51-old's contract actually expires at the end of the season.
"Manqoba is a mature person, mature and emotionally very stable. Whilst it might be disappointing, the club can be sure they will get the full support from Manqoba," Makaab said before confirming that Mngqithi's contract expires in June 2023.
"His contract ends at the end of the season," he said when asked about Mngqithi's contract situation.
The Siya crew has gathered information that Mngqithi has a few suitors in the DStv Premiership, with Royal AM believed to be one of the admirers.
Soccer Laduma has been led to believe that AM have earmarked Mngqithi for a coaching position at the club, although they have not held formal talks with his representatives.
According to Siya sources, Thwihli Thwahla's approach to Mngqithi will depend on how co-coaches Khabo Zondo and Abram Nteo fare when the league resumes virtually next year.
AmaZulu are also believed to have approached Mngqithi after parting ways with Brandon Truter but that was before the restructuring of the technical team at Sundowns, before the KwaZulu-Natal side settled for Romain Folz.
The Brazilians chairman Tlhopane Motsepe could have also hinted that the club will not recycle the coaches after saying that they had to "evolve" following the elevation of Mokwena as head coach.
Motsepe also stressed that they needed to have consistency across the reporting lines at the club.
"We decided to take the change now because it is also important in football and in life, you must always evolve," Motsepe said at the World Football Summit in Durban this week.
"You must always look at ways to improve because if you don't do that, then really you might find yourself in the situation you are getting overtaken by others who are willing to improve and evolve."
