Unhappy Sundowns players are free to leave – Pitso
Pitso Mosimane insists that he will not stand in the way of his Mamelodi Sundowns if they wish to walk out on the club as a number of them are frustrated at “Jingles” for starving them game time.
Mamelodi Sundowns coach Pitso Mosimane (L) saw his team surrender a 28-match unbeaten record in the South African Premiership Tuesday hours after being slammed by a Guinea-Bissau star he recently released. AFP/File/TORU YAMANAKA
Thela Ngobeni is the only player who as officially left the Absa Premiership champions as he has joined Highlands Park after spending a number of years idling at Chloorkop.
“I don’t get involved in that a lot because it is the space of the agents and but I don’t want to be the kind of coach that the players say he wanted to go to Real Madrid but the coach says I must go to Bloemfontein Celtic. It is not right so if they want to leave they need to say and if you are contracted you need to honour the contract,” says Mosimane.
The general belief in the corridors is that Sundowns take advantage of their financial muscle to lure players to the club, and while that may be true as they are, after all, owned by billionaire and mining magnate Patrice Motsepe, Mosimane says more often than not, it is the players who get themselves in situations where they are caught between game time or earning a good salary and run the risk of not playing regularly as Downs are a star-studded outfit.
“We make mistakes as teams and the players make mistakes with their agents and cry for game time. Sometimes they cry for money more than anything and then you get the money but you are not guaranteed game time. So what do you do as a player? Some players take a pay cut and they go elsewhere to play but this market has become different. Sometimes you find big names that we all know as big names but they end up not finding the team that they want then they settle for whatever they find,” Mosimane said.
“Sometimes it catches up with the players because they sign contracts and they make sure that they get the money that they think they deserve. If it does not work out then you start complaining about not getting game time. Somebody can say come play, but you will probably not get the same salary you get at Sundowns,” he adds.
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