PSL business: French Club circling top Bafana prospect

A European club has substantial interest in one of the PSL brightest stars. He’s tipped to be one of Bafana’s next best things.

Malibongwe Khoza in action for Mamelodi Sundowns in the Betway Premiership. Image: @lorenzKO/X

There are plenty of PSL youngsters catching foreign attention, including Mamelodi Sundowns centre-back Malibongwe Khoza.

The 21-year-old has burst onto the scene this season, amassing thirteen league appearances in his debut campaign. According to reports, French side Stade Rennes FC are monitoring the Gauteng native.

“Rennes FC representatives and scouts have been monitoring Mali’s (Khoza’s) progress as they have watched most of his games and they are happy with him,” SoccerLaduma reported.

“It’s believed that they want to assess him in their own environment and see what he can do. Though they are happy with the potential they have seen in him.”

A second source reaffirmed the links, saying, “The club won’t stand in the way of a player if that chance comes but the only thing is that they would request that he can go for an assessment in July after the FIFA Club World Cup.

“But yes, the interest is there and it’s promising as long as he can go there and prove that he can do it.”

Pirates back in the race?

Following Orlando Pirates’ draw to Stellenbosch while Mamelodi Sundowns simultaneously defeated AmaZulu last week, the PSL race looked dead and buried as the Brazilians extended their gap to eighteen points.

The Buccaneers faced the league leaders yesterday and prevailed, closing the gap and suggesting their PSL hopes are far from over; Jose Riveiro had this to say after the game:

“Every point is important in a league where it seems there’s one team who’s going to finish close to 80 points, probably by the end of the season,” said Riveiro

“So obviously if you want to compete with them, when you look at the schedule, you cannot say to yourself, ‘Okay, here if we get a point, it’s fine’, or even today playing against them, ‘If we get a point, it’s going to be alright’, it’s not.

“You have to always fight for the maximum points, and again, it’s a pity that we’re not arriving in this game – obviously we’re going into the space of the ‘ifs’, but still we have four games more to play than them,” the Orlando Pirates boss added.

“It would have been nice to have [had] those games played already, come here and maybe, I don’t know, even if we are six or seven points behind them and even three points, just that little advantage would give the game a different dimension, I’m sure.

“It would then speak more clear about our reality. The reality is that we have – how many points right now? A lot of points, I think it’s not frequent at this moment of the season, with this amount of games.

“But if you only look at the gap, maybe you can think the way that people maybe were thinking too much this week that this [title race] is over, and we’re not doing well, and all these things that you were asking me before the match, and now we’re here.”