A TOUCH OF SCANDAL

He had quite a reputation for not showing up when he was needed by Bafana Bafana, but Benni blamed it on his managers in Europe, saying they wouldn’t release him. In 2010, he was removed from Bafana’s Fifa World Cup squad for allegedly bringing prostitutes to his hotel room.

Benni denied it. “We did not bring girls to the hotel,” he said then. “We were given a night off and when we got back there were girls in the foyer who recognised me. They asked for a photo and one of them asked for my Bafana Bafana shirt. My mistake was going with her to my room to get the shirt. The hotel security plus the Bafana security were there and they saw I went up to my room to get some shirts for them.”