OPINION: ‘Caretaker’ is a misnomer in South African football

On Monday morning, Cape Town City announced that they had parted ways with interim coach Muhsin Ertugral following a string of poor results that saw the team going for 10 matches without a win.

The last stroke for Ertugral was losing at home to Marumo Gallants last Saturday. It was their second defeat at home this month having lost 2-0 to AmaZulu at the beginning of March.

ALSO READ: Ertugral breaks silence after Cape Town City exit

With games running out and the team slowly being pulled into the relegation quagmire, a decision had to be made, unfortunately, that decision was to get rid of Ertugral.

Ertugral was appointed as City’s technical director in January and was later asked to be the interim head coach until the end of the season after the club fired Eric Tinkler. However the Turkish coach failed to change the club’s fortunes and was fired.

He, like many others in the Premier Soccer League, was a victim of making a poor decision.

Ertugral, like many other technical directors in the Premier Soccer League (PSL), “tried to help” by accepting the interim coach position, but now he is without a job because he could not help City.

Ertugral’s situation reminds me of Calvin Johnson who was appointed as the head of the academy at Kaizer Chiefs in September 2023 but later assumed the role of caretaker coach following Molefi Ntseki’s sacking. After finishing in 10th place in the 23/24 season, Amakhosi’s lowest finish in the PSL era, Johnson too was shown the door at Chiefs.

To his defence, Johnson knew what he was getting himself into because soon after his appointment, the former Platinum Stars coach did say that there’s no such thing as a “caretaker coach” in football.

ALSO READ: Itumeleng Khune: I’m South Africa’s best goalkeeper

Ironically, Johnson had replaced Ntseki, who was also originally appointed as the head of technical and youth development before assuming the head coach following Arthur Zwane’s sacking.

Morgan Mammila also left his technical director role at Chippa United at some stage to take up the role of head coach and he too was fired by Siviwe Mpengesi for not bringing the desired results.  

I could go on and on and make more examples but the point I’m trying to make is that Ertugral’s failure led to his own demise.