Downs players’ lack of game time a major concern for Broos

The Sundowns players formed the backbone of the national team, especially at the Africa Cup of Nations(Afcon) earlier this year when Bafana bagged the bronze medal against all odds.

Now Broos has major concerns about the lack of game time for the Sundowns players. In the past five weeks, Sundowns played three matches in the MTN8 and were inactive for two weeks while the CAF preliminary rounds were under way.

Sundowns will again form the core of his squad for the two 2025 Afcon qualifiers against Uganda and South Sudan. They face Uganda at home at Orlando Stadium on Friday (6pm), and then travel to South Sudan for their second match on Tuesday.

Broos’ main concern is Themba “Mshishi” Zwane, who is in and out of the starting line-up and is more of a bench warmer of late. In two games he was hauled off after an hour and in one game he was an unused substitute.

“For the moment, I don’t understand why he’s not playing. Is he suddenly being old? I don’t know, I’m not there,” said Broos.

“I don’t see him in training, but I think it’s more a tactical reason why he’s not playing.

“I know that’s the decision of the club coach and I must respect it. It will not be a problem for now but if it goes on, it can become a problem. A player like him must play very often.

“When a player at his age is always on the bench and coming in for the final 20 minutes, I hope the new coach (Manqoba Mngqithi) changes his mind about using him like that. I want to see more of Themba at Sundowns than what I am seeing now.”

Stellenbosch and Orlando Pirates have been playing five weeks on the trot because of MTN8 and CAF preliminary round matches, and Broos feels it is the reason they are the best-performing PSL clubs. The two clubs have reached the MTN8 final, at the expense of Sundowns and Cape Town City.

Broos’ fears about Sundowns’ lack of game time were spot-on because no one could have predicted they would suffer back-to-back defeats against an untried, yet youthful Stellenbosch side in successive weeks.

“You only have players from Stellenbosch and Orlando Pirates who have played games in Champions League and Confederation Cup qualifiers, games you have to win or you are out of the competition,” said Broos.

“Against Sundowns, you saw Stellenbosch were in the game from the beginning, because they already had those CAF games under their belts.

“This was not the Sundowns we know. They have not played enough official games. I’m talking about games where winning and losing is important.

“Because the PSL was negotiating a new sponsor, we knew the Premiership games would start later. We wrote to them and asked if we could have the players a week earlier, without success.

“It is up to us to manage the problem. I hope we can find a good solution to win both games against Uganda and South Sudan.”

On Sunday, Mngqithi added to Broos’ concerns when he said his star players were struggling to find form.

“We have been struggling with some of our key players and their performances,” said Mngqithi.

“It’s unfortunate because almost everybody played well in the pre-season and you begin to wonder, at this stage, what’s happening.

“It’s an area that needs the technical team to look at very closely. It’s two, if not three matches where performances were not at the level that we would like it to be.”