Has the risk paid off? This season’s numbers when fit
When Keagan Dolly was signed, it carried a risk for Kaizer Chiefs for four different reasons. Firstly, he had not played regular football in almost five years as his time at Montpellier saw injuries and other factors limit his minutes.
From January 2017 when he signed for the French club, until June 2021 when his deal expired, Dolly had 22 starts and 42 substitute outings to show for his time in the South of France. Basically, he was averaging 500-odd minutes per season.
The player’s injury record was another red flag as it played a part in his lack of regular minutes on the Mediterranean Sea. Chiefs knew he wasn’t necessarily a durable player who would play every week.
Thenwehadthefactthathe wasn’t even that experienced in the local game with just 89 appearances in the top-flight and a best-ever goal return of four strikes in a season. That’s a similar number of outings in the big league to Yusuf Maart, who was renowned as a late bloomer.
The final possible red flag was that he was returning to local shores in the first place. Surely a 28-year-old playing in a big five league could at least have moved to Belgium or the Netherlands. With the massive pay packet he was able to demand, one could question whether it may lead to a lack of
hunger. number 10, a left winger or as a number 10. The second season for the left-footer saw six goals and five assists in 31 matches, whilst this season has seen one assist in eight matches.
If we add those stats together, we come out at eight goals and eight assists in his last 59 appearances. Now, we can partly blame Chiefs’ lack of a ruthless striker for Dolly having so few assists. You can guarantee if he was playing with Peter Shalulile that his goal creation numbers would be a lot higher. The question is whether this dip in his scoring and creating data is something that will reverse itself or whether it’s too late for that at the age of 31.
This season, Dolly missed the first 10 matches due to the knee surgery he underwent. Back on 23 April 2023, he was injured against Sekhukhune United and it took until 3 October to see him back on the pitch against Cape Town City. Those five-odd months coincided with an off-season break, but still, Chiefs paid out millions of Rands to Dolly with no return during that time.
His first start was under Cavin Johnson, away to Golden Arrows in an inside right posin ition a narrow 4-3-2-1 formation. It was a very quiet return with just one touch in the box, five passes into the final third and two shots set up for teammates in his 66 minutes of pitch time. Next up was a game against bottom-placed Cape Town Spurs. Dolly was again used high up and narrow on the right and this time creating six chances including assisting Christian Saile’s goal. He played practically the full match in a big step towards returning to his best level. In the Soweto Derby in November, Amakhosi had just two shots (none on target) in the first half as the pint-sized attacker was tasked to provide genuine width, something that isn’t really his game anymore. Maybe it was a bit much to throw him into a game of that magnitude so soon after his return as he picked up an injury and wasn’t seen in the four matches prior to the Africa Cup of Nations break.
Since the hiatus, Dolly has started twice. He was used as a pure numb er 10 against Moroka Swallows but was sacrificed early due to Edmilson Dove’s red card. It was an ineffective display with just 22 touches of the ball and no dribbles or chances created. The lack of real influence when used as a number 10 continued in the 1-0 win over Arrows as Chiefs only mustered six shots all game, none of which were taken by or created by Dolly.
An injury leading up to the recent Soweto Derby ruled him out of that match, so we are not sure if he would have started. The likelihood is that he may have been selected with Mduduzi Mdantsane left on the bench.