And the PSL player of the year is...
‘I hope new guys get kick out of Bafana’
MAZOLA MOLEFE
PERCY TAU, rather predictably, took the lion’s share of the prize money at the Premier Soccer League awards last night as he was crowned Footballer of the Season and Players’ Player of the Season – an honour bestowed on him by his peers.
The total amount the Mamelodi Sundowns attacker pocketed for collecting the two awards came to a staggering R450 000.
He was the favourite long before the end of the 2017-18 season, one in which he helped the Brazilians clinch the Absa Premiership title earlier this month.
All 16 PSL coaches cast their vote for the Footballer of the Season and the majority – as evidenced by Tau being the recipient of the coveted accolade – picked the 24-year-old as the best player this year.
He beat Siphesihle Ndlovu of Maritzburg United and teammate and captain Hlompho Kekana, who were nominated alongside him last week.
Subsequent to his marauding performances in the campaign that has just ended, Tau, who started 29 of his side’s 30 league games and scored 11 goals while also having a hand in 15 others, has already become the subject of speculation linking him to a move abroad. His coach Pitso Mosimane confirmed earlier this week that he had resigned himself to losing the player to a club in Europe because the Brazilians have received numerous offers for his services – and Tau is said to be keen to test himself overseas.
Another player who also enjoyed a great deal of attention this season, although not as much as Tau, was the young Ndlovu at Maritzburg.
He also walked away with two awards last night – he was named the Midfielder of the Season as well as the Young Player of the Season – with combined prize money of R100 000.
While the Young Player of the Season gong did not come as a surprise, being crowned the Midfielder of the Season ahead of Kekana and Orlando Pirates’ Musa Nyatama could possibly be an ongoing debate.
Both Kekana and Nyatama were seen as vital cogs in the championship race for their respective clubs – guiding Sundowns to win the league in Kekana’s case, while Nyatama morphed into a goalscorer and creator for the Buccaneers, who finished runners-up.
Ndlovu too was important for the Team of Choice, but at times his inexperience was noticeable and Maritzburg finished in fourth place.
The criterion set was to only take league matches into account, but it would have been nearly impossible to ignore the fact that Ndlovu’s team reached the semi-finals of the MTN8, the final of the Nedbank Cup and achieved their highest ever finish on the log table.
Meanwhile, Sundowns coach Mosimane was also among the winners last night as he stepped up to collect the Coach of the Season award, a category in which he was nominated alongside Maritzburg’s Fadlu Davids and Micho Sredojevic of Pirates.
The Brazilians clinched their third title in four full seasons under Mosimane and have not finished below second place since he arrived, with the 2012-13 campaign BAFANA BAFANA coach Stuart Baxter yesterday revealed he’d picked his 20-man Cosafa Cup squad hoping to find alternatives for the national team’s Africa Cup of Nations qualifier at home against Libya.
“Maybe there are a couple we wanted here (the Cosafa Cup is being hosted in Polokwane, but not under the Fifa calendar), but what is happening is that we are giving ourselves some alternatives. I am guessing there are a few who are going to be in the Afcon squad in September because we have started this transformation of the team with the trip to Zambia (in March) and we have given others who were very good another chance to get more caps under their belts,” Baxter explained.
Bafana don’t yet know Sunday’s opponents in the Cosafa Cup having received a bye in the first round of the competition as a seeded team.
But this hasn’t stopped Baxter from plotting the way forward.
“This is an ambitious and promising group. They are diligent and we are working on giving them a bit of structure. I will encourage that they should put their signature on the playing style as well. I have never had a week for preparation with any national team anywhere in the world, but this is also a bad time for SA players to be selected – we have no chance in getting a full team like I have seen with Zimbabwe here,” he said.
“But I told the players they are not here by default, but by design this time around, which is also a little bit unusual for Cosafa because we know how it usually pans out (clubs are not obliged to release players outside the Fifa calendar).”
Baxter singled out leftback Innocent Maela and Siphesihle Ndlovu as two players knocking hard on the door to be included in more crucial national team games in future – like the 2019 Afcon qualifiers later this year. “Ndlovu did okay in the Four Nations and he has looked good in training. If he gets a couple of games here then I think he is going to be a candidate for the (Afcon) squad. Maybe there are others, like Innocent Maela,” the coach said.
“We took him (Maela) to the Cosafa one year ago and he was at Thanda (Royal Zulu, in the National First Division), and on the back of his performances for us he went to Orlando Pirates. Last year he was galloping up and down the line. Now he is playing and affecting the game. This does have a positive effect on their development. I am hoping the rest get a kick from this as well.”
@superjourno