Safa still cagey about when new coach will be named
A NEW Bafana Bafana coach will be announced soon after the Angola match‚ which will be played in East London tomorrow‚ SA Football Association (Safa) president Danny Jordaan said yesterday.
Still‚ though‚ Jordaan could only say he hoped that would be the case, but could not be pinned down on an exact day.
He did make the assurance again that the new man had been identified and it was simply a matter of tying up a contract.
Jordaan was speaking at a media conference in Durban yesterday following Bafana’s 3-1 friendly win against Guinea-Bissau at the Moses Mabhida Stadium on Saturday.
He said speculation in the media that Safa had been unable to tie down a coach to replace Shakes Mashaba‚ who was sacked in December‚ had arisen from the association’s efforts to keep the public informed on the process of finding a coach. “I think the mistake we made was that we told you in the beginning we had 65 applications and walked you through the process‚” Jordaan said.
“And as we went down from 65 to 20 to five, that’s where the momentum came. And then we could not disrupt the selection of the teams and bring uncertainty into these two matches [against Guinea-Bissau and Angola].
“These matches are important as preparation for the Cape Verde match in the World Cup.
“But the one thing that is very clear is that Bafana Bafana is one of the most desired jobs as a coach from all over the world.
“Yesterday [Saturday] and today [Sunday] I got more CVs.
“And people saying just look again. And I said‚ ‘No man‚ the process is closed and the media will fight us if we say it’s open again’.
“We must close it now and make the announcement‚ and we will make the announcement.
“But we have also departed from the process where just officials make the decision.
“We have Benni McCarthy‚ Neil Tovey‚ Farouk Khan and Lucas Radebe [on Safa’s technical committee]‚ who sifted through the names and decided who the coach should be.
“And there’s an agreement on who the coach is now. It is just to sign the details.
“We hope that it is soon after the Angola match.”