Kurt Lentjies to be player-coach in Chippa’s last game

Siviwe Mpengesi surprised almost everyone when he announced Kurt Lentjies as Chippa United’s interim coach after the firing of Gavin Hunt.

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Before that, Lentjies had been one of the long serving players at the Eastern Cape-based side.

He has done fairly well as a coach and managed to help the team survive relegation with a game to spare. As part of celebrating that and doing his last dance as a player, Lentjies will play for the Chilli Boys for the last time on Saturday. 

The 37-year-old will then hang up his boots and take up coaching on a full-time basis. 

“As the chairman (Siviwe Mpengesi) promised me after I played my last game against Maritzburg United, I will definitely walk into the field to play for 27 minutes in the last game for my farewell,” Lentjies said this week. 

“I will play for 27 minutes and coach the rest. That’s our agreement with the chairman. I got the opportunity halfway through the season as a player going into the coaching industry. 

“This job just came my way. God blessed me with the opportunity to coach. I had to decide whether I hang up the boots to coach these guys, which I’m enjoying very much. I’m happy the most important thing is we secured our status for next season so we can start building,” said the former Maritzburg United and Mamelodi Sundowns player.

It has been a long time since a club had a player-coach in the local professional football.

Chippa will host relegation-threatened TS Galaxy at Nelson Mandela Bay in their last game of the season.