Mamelodi Sundowns head coach Rulani Mokwena has reiterated his statement that Saturday’s MTN8 opponents are “historically very lucky” and why he believes the Amakhosi have God watching over them – revealing a story of when he first met Dr. Kaizer Motaung.
Mokwena recently stated that Chiefs “are historically very lucky” when the Glamour Boys scored a late equaliser against his side in the league before Neo Maema found an ever later winner.
Many saw his comments as a jibe against the Amakhosi, but he has now explained that exactly the opposite is actually the case, because he was praising the club.
“I know somebody is waiting for a headline, somebody is waiting for a statement that they can misuse – like this statement I made to say ‘Kaizer Chiefs is a very lucky team’, and people took that statement and they ran with it,” he said on Thursday.
“My goodness, I wish someone would say ‘I was a very lucky person’. Because when someone says you are lucky, they actually are saying… there is a divinity, God’s hands sometimes fall in your favour.
“Imagine someone says to you that you are chosen by God, and in most cases you are the one that God chooses when he has to choose between you and others, and people try to misconstrue, misuse.
“I can 100% tell you, as a kid who grew up in Orlando West I know – having experienced so many games of Pirates vs Chiefs first hand, I know when I would watch so many games, my goodness, I would understand the feeling and the touch when Chiefs won.
“I would hear what the people would say, I would read the story-lines when Pirates played Chiefs, when Swallows played Chiefs, and [in] how many games you just saw God’s divine hand following Kaizer Chiefs.
“It is very true, God must be a Kaizer Chiefs supporter.
“And there is no greater, no greater compliment that could be given – you guys laugh but I’m being serious. Honestly, I wish someone would say to me ‘my goodness God loves you’, and not only say it but really have the evidence to point to say it’s true.
“We’re playing against a very good team, a well-coached team and I say this with a lot [of respect]. I know where you guys are going and it’s ok.”
After his words were met with some laughter among the journalists, Mokwena revealed an exchange between him and Dr. Kaizer Motaung in their very first meeting.
“Let me share a story, when I met Tata Kaizer Motaung for the first time, he called me and he said ‘I’ve been meaning to speak to you for many years… if it wasn’t for your grandfather and his passing away you would’ve been with Kaizer Chiefs’.
“I looked at him and said ‘what do you mean?’, he said ‘the amount of the respect I have for your grandfather and what he did for my career, I would never have started this incredible football club if he was still alive’.
“Imagine, if at any point my grandfather sitting in heaven felt I was disrespecting Kaizer Chiefs, with that statement that I’ve just made… so I speak about it, knowing exactly what I’m saying because there is a very strong link, a huge amount of respect that I have for the football club and for Dr. Kaizer Motaung.
“That’s why I speak and say they are a club that has, they really have some form of direct line with the heavens and that’s what we have to know, that’s the profile of the team that we play on Saturday.”
Sundowns face Chiefs in the first leg of their MTN8 semi-final at FNB Stadium on Saturday at 15;30.
