Hunt denies Kaizer Chiefs contact after Middendorp sacking

Gavin Hunt insists he has not spoken to Kaizer Chiefs about taking over as head coach, following the sacking on Wednesday of Ernst Middendorp.

Hunt, a four-time Absa Premiership winner, is a free agent after parting ways at the end of this season with Bidvest Wits, who have sold their status to TTM.

“No one (from Chiefs) has spoken to me,” said Hunt on Wednesday, when contacted by Phakaaathi, immediately after Middendorp’s firing was announced by the club.

“Right now I don’t want to comment on anything,” he added, when asked if he would potentially be interested in taking the job at Naturena.

The 56 year-old, however, will surely be on the radar of an Amakhosi side desperate for trophies, having not won a single piece of domestic silverware in the last five years.

Hunt won three league titles in a row with SuperSport Untied, between 2007 and 2010, and then won the Absa Premiership in 2016/17 with Bidvest Wits, with whom he also won the MTN8 and Telkom Knockout, while in almost all of his seven seasons in charge playing a major part in the race for the title.

This season, Wits were also in the running right up until the final few games, and ended up finishing fourth, only missing out on a place in the Caf Confederation Cup next season on goal difference to Orlando Pirates.

Wits also reached the Nedbank Cup semifinals, where they were narrowly beaten 3-2 by Mamelodi Sundowns.

One obstacle to Hunt joining could Kaizer Chiefs’ transfer ban, with their appeal against the two-window ban, imposed on them by Fifa, over the signing of Madagascan midfielder Andriamirado Andrianarimanana, heard on Wednesday by the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland.

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