FACING THE FURY OF THE FANS
... And it doesn’t get any easier for them as they face log leaders Sundowns today
Arsenal football fans demonstrate over the involvement of the club’s owner, Stan Kroenke, in the failed launch of a European Super League at the club’s Emirates Stadium in London, England, on Friday. The mooted league collapsed after an outcry by fans and the withdrawal of all the English teams.
● Fans, what fans? This could be a question from discerning Kaizer Chiefs supporters as they constantly hear the club management, head coach and players lamenting how much they’ve missed their backing from the stands this season.
The chorus on “how we’ve missed our fans” reached fever pitch at the beginning of this month when Kaizer Chiefs boss Kaizer Motaung suggested that one of the reasons the club failed to win the league last season was because they played in empty stadiums in their last nine league matches due to the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic.
Following a seventh DStv Premiership loss (2-1) against Cape Town City on Wednesday, Chiefs coach Gavin Hunt was asked how much his players have missed their fans in a season that’s looking more disastrous than any other that Amakhosi have had in the Premier Soccer League era.
“In a club like Kaizer Chiefs it certainly doesn’t help not having supporters [in the stands], because that’s been the cornerstone of the football club for the last 50 years,” said Hunt, who’s yet to experience the atmosphere of having club supporters in the stadium, having joined Chiefs at the beginning of this campaign.
There’s one main factor, but that’s out of my hands
Gavin Hunt, Chiefs coach
Awful on the field
It is difficult though for Chiefs to use the absence of fans as the main reason they have been so awful on the field this season, losing Premiership matches to Mamelodi Sundowns (3-0), who they visit today at Loftus, Swallows FC (1-0), SuperSport United (2-1), Maritzburg United (2-0), Orlando Pirates (21), AmaZulu FC (2-1) before the defeat at home against City on Wednesday.
It’s worth remembering that Chiefs have had their fans present in their numbers in the four-and-half seasons before the outbreak of the pandemic and in that time they have had no joy.
They are now almost ending a sixth campaign without winning silverware.
Their opponents today, Sundowns, are top of the log and going strong for their fourth successive league title, the last one won in the absence of their ever-singing yellow-clad fans.
It is debatable also that Hunt would still be sitting on that Chiefs bench today had the fans been in the stands in his maiden season with Amakhosi.
Those same fans are the ones who chased away Steve Komphela, now Sundowns’ senior coach, on April 21 2018 when Chiefs were beaten 2-0 by Free State Stars in the semifinal of the Nedbank Cup.
Some parts of Moses Mabhida stands were on fire as Chiefs fans ran riot, fed up with seeing Komphela failing to win a single trophy in three seasons after succeeding Stuart Baxter, the coach who had signed off with a league title in 2015.
Less than a month before Komphela was forced to resign following the scenes at Moses Mabhida, he had been lucky to get out of the FNB Stadium alive after Chiefs fans pelted him and his players with missiles after a humiliating 3-0 defeat to Chippa United in a league clash.
Chiefs hotheads
Hunt has not had to endure what Komphela went through. Imagine how the Chiefs hotheads would have reacted to seeing their club get a thumping from Maritzburg away, AmaZulu at home and by first division side
Richards Bay at home in the first round of the Nedbank Cup?
Chiefs under Hunt have had no consistency, rhythm in flashes and the line-up has been chopped and changed far too often as Hunt tries to find his best team.
After the loss against City you can expect more changes today, especially in the middle of the park where Njabulo Blom and Bernard Parker struggled to match City’s Thabo Mokeke and Mpho Makola.
While Peter Shalulile has been banging in the goals, nine in the league, Chiefs’ top scorer last season, Samir Nurkovic (two goals in the league), has been off the boil since recovering from an injury that kept him out at the beginning of the current campaign.
“I think we’ve had a lot of opportunities in that position (No 9) and we should have a player with double figures, that’s for sure,” Hunt said of Chiefs’ struggles for goals, 25 versus Sundowns’ 47.
“But it has been because of unavailability (of players), lots of missed games and a whole lot of other reasons. There’s one main factor, but that’s out of my hands.”
The “main factor” Hunt mentioned could be that Nurkovic is still sulking after the club denied him an opportunity to leave when Egyptian giants Al Ahly came knocking for his signature early this season.