Sekhukhune United coach Brandon Truter says there is no contest for the Coach of the Season award because it has to go to Mamelodi Sundowns‘ Rulani Mokwena.
It is that time of the year when the debate of who deserves to win what at the end of the season has started to rumble, with Mokwena leading the charge of that – that his players such as Teboho Mokoena and Ronwen Williams, one of them should win the PSL Footballer of the Season.
Mokwena was given the sole charge of Sundowns job in October last year following a crushing loss to Orlando Pirates in the MTN8 semi-final second leg.
Manqoba Mngqithi and Steve Komphela, who Mokwena shared the role with, were given other roles, with the latter redeployed as the First Team coach and Mngqithi being handed the Senior Coach role.
These roles were never heard before, but essential Sundowns were trying to play it down that Mngqithi and Komphela are Mokwena’s assistant coaches, in the move not to damage the dressing room.
Mokwena has turned Sundowns into a monster team, winning the league with seven games to spare, where he made it a mockery for other teams and the rest of the continent.
The former Orlando Pirates caretaker coach went 24 matches without a loss before Stellenbosch ended all that in the Nedbank Cup quarter-finals.
Mokwena has led Sundowns to the semi-final of the CAF Champions League for the first time since the 2018/19 season, brushing aside CR Belouizdad of Algeria by 6-2 in the two-legged quarter-final tie.
In the first leg in Algeria, Sundowns played football that was pleasing to the eye, winning 4-1 before winning the second leg at home this past weekend by 2-1.
They will now face Wydad Casablanca in the two-legged semi-final, with Moroccan being the side that beat Sundowns on penalties in 2019 away.
Sundowns are considered heavy favourites to win the Champions League and showed that in the group stages by crushing 10th-time winners Al Ahly 5-2, etching their name in history as they became the first side to beat Egyptian giants by five goals on two separate occasions.
“I think the coach of the season should be Rulani for what they have achieved – Champions League and also in the league as well, winning with such big margins,” said Truter if he himself should be in the reckoning for the coach of the season award having led two teams in the semi-finals of knockout competitions.
“His team is playing fantastic football as well.”
Truter took AmaZulu to the MTN8 semi-final and now Sekhukhune to the semi-finals of the Nedbank Cup.
“It’s also not nice being a coach taking two teams in one season in the semi-finals,” added Truter.
In the 2020/21 season, Sundowns’ fans were up in arms when the coach of the season award went to Benni McCarthy of AmaZulu after he led the Durban club to second spot having arrived after the season had started, though Sundowns claimed the title with three games to spare.
