The story behind the scenes
The big Chiefs risk
For Amakhosi to see any real value ahead of making the final call on the player’s future in the coming months, they need the player on the pitch and they need him to score goals.
When he was a regular, his stock was rising, especially at the time Middendorp seemed to have turned him into a proven scoring machine.
News that Nurkovic had finally agreed to fresh terms with the club earlier this year, cooling talks that he could leave, was further evidence to how influential he’d become in such a short space of time.
Chiefs already had a contract in place until June 2022, so in essence they had no reason to panic – but they risked having to manage a player whose head had been turned by interest in the Middle East and North Africa.
While the rumoured transfer fee was below the club’s valuation of their key asset, the salary numbers that were being thrown around were enough to unsettle Nurkovic and meant Amakhosi possibly wouldn’t get the best out of him.
The ideal scenario at the time was to then improve his contract and, as has since been confirmed by his agent Dajan Simac to the Siya crew, add a clause in his renegotiated terms to keep him stable and happy at Naturena. Nurkovic wasn’t playing for his future then, but he is now – whether that is at Chiefs or elsewhere should the club not trigger the option, which is unlikely at this stage.
Usually, an option clause is agreed to in advance and it’s just up to the club to exercise it to hold on to the player.
It also buys them time to discuss a new deal without too much pressure.
But in the event that there’s an arrangement to discuss new salary terms when the option is triggered, that would then depend on Nurkovic’s form at the time. Sitting
in the treatment room, recovering from injury, does him no favours.
It’s even more of a dilemma if Chiefs decide to cut him loose when he’s not played enough games to show a potential suitor that he can still deliver like he did during his maiden season at the club.
Lazarous Kambole is one such example.
The Zambian, who signed for the club at the same time as Nurkovic in July 2019, is also now in the final
year of his contract and was transfer-listed at the end of the previous season. But no one is biting.
Kambole hasn’t done enough since joining the Glamour Boys.
If there are interested parties, it’s either Amakhosi aren’t satisfied with the bids being tabled or the player won’t lower his salary demands.
Nurkovic needs to play to keep his stock up!
Would Baxter let him go?
The Siya crew understands that coach Stuart Baxter would be understanding if there was a lucrative offer for Nurkovic and the club approved the sale.
It’s good business and the Englishman, having been in the game for as long as he has and now in his second stint at Chiefs, will know a good deal when he sees one.
According to insiders at Naturena, ahead of his appointment four months ago, the coach is believed to have been consulted regarding potential signings.
While some players had already been recruited during Hunt’s tenure, there were a few that Chiefs discussed with Baxter – and the likelihood of Nurkovic being sold to the Middle East or North Africa came up.
Grobler remained a target then, but a week after Baxter was confirmed as the new Amakhosi coach, the Siya crew broke the news that SuperSport had tied the striker down on a new two-year deal.
Soccer Laduma also reported that, while the Tshwane outfit were open to selling Grobler given the interest locally, he would only leave the club for a figure of around R6 million – small change had Chiefs been able to sell Nurkovic.
Baxter was also a fan of Grobler from his days as both SuperSport and Bafana Bafana coach, so he is understood to have backed the recommendation by his predecessor Hunt to try lure the player to Naturena.
The door might be closed on Grobler because of two factors: his transfer fee and his age, as he will turn 34 in January.
Chiefs are believed to be assessing their options for the upcoming transfer window and could bring in a foreign striker if Kambole is offloaded to free up one of the five spots allocated to non-South African players.
Nurkovic’s injury might also force the club into the market depending on what happens over the next few weeks, before the window reopens in January.
Nurkovic wont’ be short of suitors
When approached for comment by the Siya crew over the future of the player, his camp insisted that there was no urgency in engaging Chiefs.
“Samir is focusing on his recovery at the moment. But yes, I can confirm that his contract is up at the end of the season. Chiefs do have an option to extend it for another year, but it’s too early to have those discussions,” was the response from his agent earlier this month.
This suggests some sort of stability, especially with the final decision in the club’s hands regarding what lies ahead for Nurkovic.
But his camp will not necessarily just be sitting and waiting, the nature of football is that the Serbian’s representatives will try and be prepared for any eventuality.
It would be worth their while to keep tabs on the previous interest from Abha FC, Kuwait SC and Al Ahly – just in case.
The player has in the past told local media that he was flattered by the links to the Middle East and especially North Africa, suggesting that he would be open to another fresh challenge should the opportunity arise.
By now, Nurkovic has also established himself in the Premier Soccer
League and were he to be available on a free, you can expect Chiefs’ rivals to queue for his signature. Perhaps returning to his native country of Serbia or the Slovakian league where Amakhosi picked him up on a free could also be an alternative, although it is unlikely that he would be in the same wage bracket as he is now.
In Europe, Nurkovic was playing in the lower leagues, where there is a gradual move towards signing younger players on free transfers now that COVID-19 is a reality and has affected clubs financially.
Going to the Gulf region, North Africa or remaining in South Africa is more of a lucrative route for the striker at this point in time.
Underestimate the role of the supporters in football at your own peril. If you are a club owner or a coach and want an honest opinion on any matter regarding the club’s affairs or team selection or how a certain player is doing, the best person to speak to is the supporter. Yes, of course, there are a lot of armchair critics who criticise for the sake of it, and who will at times look at situations with rose-tinted glasses or show bias depending on which side of the fence they’re sitting, but they are in the minority. Hence, to get a true account of how valuable Samir Nurkovic is to Kaizer Chiefs, and whether having him around is a good idea or he should be sold at the next available opportunity, the Soccer Laduma team went out to ask the club’s supporters for their opinions. The reaction is a little divided, and perhaps understandably so for a life who took to life at Naturena like a duck to water, scoring goals with frightening regularity, only to fade away in recent times, with injuries not showing him any mercy. The Serbian, therefore, has a lot to prove when he gets back onto the field, which is expected to be early next year.
He must pull up his socks
“Personally, I feel like if he wants to leave the club, he should be allowed to do so. He is earning a lot of money and we can get a lot of players from the money that he is getting paid. We can get up to five very good players for the money that he is getting paid. It does not help to hold on to a player who doesn’t deliver according to expectations. We want a striker who can score goals regularly and Nurkovic is no longer doing that and we don’t know what is happening with him. He is no longer contributing anything to the team and that does not sit well with some of us. I see it as a waste of money to pay one player a salary that can be used to pay five different players who are very good. I’m not too sure if his focus is on the clubs that are reportedly interested in him or what it is that is really going on with him. If I’m wrong, then he must pull up his socks. Regarding the 4-0 against Chippa United, I wish the team can continue playing like they did. I’m not fully convinced to say that things are back to normal now or if we have turned the corner. Yes, the players have showed us that they want to help the team to improve, but Stuart (Baxter) has a problem of chopping and changing and doesn’t seem to have his team that he is certain about. I wish he can play all the players that have been bought to play for Kaizer Chiefs and he should also play the youngsters. He mustn’t put them aside to say that they are not the players who were brought by him, because some of the players in the current squad were brought by Gavin Hunt.”
Money doesn’t play football Saddam Maake – Chiefs supporter
“You must remember that some things are beyond our control as supporters sometimes and I am not in a position to say he should stay or he should go. Nurkovic has been a good player for Kaizer Chiefs and has been scoring goals. Sometimes he would score some last-minute goals and we would all be happy that he scored for us. That guy was scoring goals like nobody’s business. But, like any other player, he too can be out of form at times and that doesn’t mean that he is not a good player. It happened to (Lebogang) Manyama also – he was scoring goals before he picked an injury, and on his return, he was no longer 100%. It is normal in football that when a player comes from injury, he struggles with his form. Since Nurkovic arrived at Chiefs, every time I read his comment anywhere about the club, he always talks good about Chiefs and the club’s supporters. For me, that was enough to convince me that the guy is here to work and to give his all for Kaizer Chiefs. As for him attracting interest from other clubs, or whether he should be sold or what, I don’t know about that and I am not willing to get involved. What I know is that when a player is doing well, clubs will always come knocking to enquire about his services. I have heard that there are clubs that are interested in (Njabulo) Blom and we can’t do anything about those things because players will always attract interest from other clubs, hence I am saying I don’t want to get involved. Some people who want Nurkovic gone always talk about his salary at Chiefs and all of that, but what I know is that money doesn’t play football and only a football player can do so. Just because a player earns so much doesn’t mean that he should perform miracles on the field. Football is like in the taxi industry, where we can both be employed as drivers for the same taxi owner, but our salaries do not necessarily have to be the same. It’s something that we should not even discuss. It is the same thing for drivers, they don’t have to tell each other how much they are going to give the owner after each day’s work. We love Samir Nurkovic, and it is up to Kaizer Chiefs to decide what happens with the player in the future. There is nothing we can do. He is our player and is in our hearts. We are proud of what he has done for Chiefs. That man can score goals from anywhere on the field and from any angle.”
We need all the firepower Masilo Machaka – Chiefs supporter
“It depends on the system that the coach uses and how he wants Nurkovic to play. Does he want to play him on the side or as a number nine? To me, I would prefer him to play as a target man because he is not that mobile where he takes on players. He is just a finisher, so you don’t need to put him on the side. Put him in the middle where he can receive balls from Dolly and Billiat. You cannot put Billiat at number nine, you are killing the guy. So, it’s all about how the coach uses Nurkovic and instils more confidence in him and how he plays with the players around him. So, I would prefer him to come back and be able to be a target man because that is something we don’t have at the moment. We can mention Bernard Parker, but he is mobile, so we cannot use him there. You can see we started to win games without Nurkovic, but I prefer that he comes back so that we have more firepower up front, so that we don’t put pressure on the likes of Billiat. We need all the firepower we can get because you see these days, when teams play against Chiefs, they feel as if they can get a draw or a win, but we have got to move away from that as Kaizer Chiefs. Teams should fear before they come to FNB stadium. We have to send the message that we are Chiefs and we have got quality there, Baxter can’t cry about that. There is no patience within the Chiefs camp where you need time to adjust. When you come here, you must deliver and if you don’t, you know what to do.
I’m just over the moon with the win over Chippa United. It was a very good present for ubaba ka (the father of) ‘Bobsteak’ (Bobby Motaung), Ntate Motaung, as he turned 77. It was his big day, so the players, the coach and the technical team knew before going onto the field that they had to do what needed to be done. Remember we came from a 1-1 draw before the long break, and Chippa drew 0-0 with SuperSport as well. If you remember, Chippa always give us problems at home. Last season, we beat them 1-0 at their home and then they came to FNB in the last game and they beat us 1-0, so they had a score to settle and that is why our players had to come to the party, so credit to them. What a player! I don’t know why he came back, but he came to the right team in Chiefs – I’m talking about Keagan Dolly. You can see the passes, the interaction between him and Khama Billiat. They remind us of when they were still at Ajax Cape Town and Mamelodi Sundowns, which means it was not a fluke for them to play together. If they did it before and they are still doing it now, it says a lot about the two players. There was unity and confidence amongst the players all the way from the back going forward. Also, Njabulo Ngcobo, I’m not sure how Stuart Baxter sees him, but he’s not okay in the midfield. I would prefer him as a defender because he was the Defender of the Season and I mean, now he’s playing in the midfield. But they why fix when it’s not broken? All in all, it was a great game to watch. We hadn’t scored four goals for a while. The Chiefs of old would score one goal and sit back and allow their opponents to equalise, but this time around, we kept on going and asking more questions and you could see that they wanted to score even more goals.”