The South African Football Association (SAFA) has confirmed that the new national men’s football team coach will be announced on Saturday, 24th April 2021.

“@SAFA_Net will announce new Bafana Bafana head coach on Saturday, 24 April 2021. More updates will be provided on this page,” the country’s football governing body tweeted on the official Bafana Bafana account.

 

Molefi Ntseki was sacked after South Africa failed to qualify for the 2021 CAF Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) finals, finishing 3rd in their group with 10 points. The Bafana Bafana were the only team to get to 10 points or more that failed to qualify for the finals as they finished behind Ghana and Sudan in a tough Group C.

Benni McCarthy

Benni McCarthy will be keen on coaching his country (Photo by RODGER BOSCH/AFP via Getty Images)

Since the sacking of the previous head coach, SAFA has held several board meetings to find a coach as quickly as possible given that the 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifiers are due to start. The next appointment will be an astonishing 15th over the last decade.

SAFA President Danny Jordaan confirmed that the technical committee would hand in their recommendations for the vacant post to the National Executive Committee.

Technical committee chairperson Jack Maluleke confirmed that the SAFA received close to 200 CVs for the vacant Bafana Bafana head coaching job.

This list has been trimmed to just 5 people and South Africa’s greatest ever footballer – Benni McCarthy – is heavily linked to the role and has expressed his desire to coach the national side.

Al Ahly coach Pitso Mosimane was also heavily linked but he quashed those rumours early on saying that he is happy with the Egyptian and African club champions.

The other 3 non-South African names linked are – Herve Renard of France, Portuguese Carlos Quieroz and Hugo Bruce from Belgium.