Sundowns’ Mokwena fuels war-of-words with Komphela

Rulani Mokwena’s subtle dig at Steve Komphela will further reinforce rumours of an alleged fallout towards the end of their working relationship at Mamelodi Sundowns.

The old idiom ‘where there’s smoke there’s fire’ certainly applies in this classic case of mentor and protégé turned into rivals. It was under Komphela where the current Sundowns head coach cut his teeth while they were both at Platinum Stars some years back.

It looks like the relationship turned sour during their second working stint at the Brazilians. Mokwena is now the commander-in-chief and Komphela served as his assistant at Sundowns before leaving at the start of the season to join Moroka Swallows.

Komphela, who is now head coach at Golden Arrows, made comments that implied Mokwena was not prepared to share information at Sundowns. 

‘Selflessness has a reward’

“You must teach other guys that selflessness has a reward. In as much as people who are selfish do get rewarded, but that reward is not the same as that of selflessness which is the ultimate reward,” said Komphela.

“Even where I’ve just been, at Moroka Swallows, I left Ditheko Mototo and Musa Nyatama. When I was there, I opened my briefcase and gave them my pin.

“I know of coaches we worked with and you’d never get anywhere close to their briefcase. His laptop has four pin codes. They hide information like it’s the pin code of a nuclear weapon.”

Mokwena’s response came in the lead up to Masandawana’s Nedbank Cup last 16 encounter against Maritzburg United tomorrow. 

Mokwena made the surprise backhanded comment in his opening remarks on the game against the Team of Choice. 

“We are looking forward to it. It should be a very interesting one. They (United) have PSL experience with some very good players and a good coach (Simo Dladla) who’s got extensive experience in this competition,” he said. 

“We are well prepared. I got an opportunity last night to clear our games and check our performance against SuperSport United. I also checked out their last game but a lot more games have been loaded on my laptop that has got five passwords, and I’ll go into it a little bit later today.”