LEGENDARY Liverpool goalkeeper Bruce Grobbelaar says he’s ready to return to coach in the PSL, and was once shortlisted by Kaizer Chiefs.
The former Zimbabwean shot-stopper told On The Whistle podcast host Zayn Nabbi, that he was hungry to return to South Africa, but most local team owners didn’t have the “cajones” to appoint him as manager.
“South Africa, I’d love to come back there,” Grobbelaar said from Norway where he works as a goalkeeping coach with second tier outfit Øygarden FK.
He said his return to the PSL all “depends if these owners have got balls”.
“I’m talking about big cajones to get Bruce Grobbelaar back for their team.”
Grobbelaar said that he’s been in touch with AmaZulu, Chippa United, and revealed that he was being lined up for the Chiefs job before Ernst Middendorp was appointed in 2018.
“I’ve been in touch with Kaizer Motaung at the Kaizer Chiefs. But I couldn’t get that one because Bobby (Motaung) was the one who was picking the coaches. So, there’s a lot of teams that have been in touch.
When contacted about Grobbelaar’s claims, Chiefs declined to comment.
In the podcast, Grobbelaar also went on to say that he had won court cases against previous teams such as SuperSport United and Mamelodi Sundowns, and this made him unpopular with key figures in the league.
“I found out that my assistant (at SuperSport United) Pitso Mosimane got a big knife in my back, and tried to get me out by saying that I was drinking,” Grobbelaar said.
“They told a lie. I took them to court and got paid out the rest of my contract at SuperSport (in 2001). And that is contrary to what rumours are in South Africa that I was fired.
“I was never fired at SuperSport. They paid me out to go.”
SuperSport United CEO Stanley Matthews declined to get into the details about why Grobbelaar left the team or his payout, but did say “as CEO of the club at the time and since then, I can tell you with certainty that Pitso had nothing to do with Bruce’s departure”.
Grobbelaar also opened up about an opportunity he once had to coach Sundowns.
“This is something that South Africans don’t know. I was asked to take over Sundowns with the Tsichlas family and I signed a pre-contract agreement (in 2000),” he said.
But Grobbelaar said the club reneged and appointed Clemens Westerhof.
“And so, it was breaking the agreement that I had with them. I took them to court. And I got paid three years of a three-year contract without coaching the team once,” he said.
Sundowns declined to comment when contacted about Grobbelaar’s claims. – THE WITNESS
