While ‘football is flying’ Kaizer Chiefs have been caught standing: William Shongwe

Legendary former Kaizer Chiefs goalkeeper William “Cool Cat” Shongwe says the club’s loss of hunger for success and failure to keep up with the changes in football trends are the reasons they have fallen far behind their rivals.

Chiefs have gone through an unprecedented eight seasons without winning silverware, with many coaching changes during that period.

While they still easily command the largest support base in the country, Chiefs are far behind the likes of not just trophy machines Mamelodi Sundowns but also Orlando Pirates, SuperSport United and Cape Town City in competitiveness on the field of play.

Shongwe said other clubs have evolved to keep up with modern-day trends on the field while Chiefs, despite boasting a world-class facility at their Naturena base and a revamped academy, have lagged in key departments regarding their first team.

“Do not underestimate that other teams have beefed up their ability to grind the result over the years. Sundowns came out and put themselves in the big mix,” Shongwe told TimesLIVE while being a TV commentator on the Cosafa Cup in Durban.   

“You look at Cape Town City, they also have not sat back and said we are a small team or a new team. Their boss is ambitious. He has come and added value to make sure his team rises to the occasion.   

“We have had people like [Sandile] Zungu who is aspiring for big things as the AmaZulu boss.

“You can see he is not just happy to have AmaZulu in the league, but wants AmaZulu to start winning things and be there among the top four or five.

“We have SuperSport who have [coach] Gavin [Hunt] who is just as ambitious regardless of the [reduced budget] situation at the club.   

“A lot of teams have developed the ambition to win things and Chiefs have always thought things will continue just because they are the glamour team.   

“I don’t think they have changed things around. Football is moving, football is flying.”   

In modern-day football, clubs have moved to have big technical teams with specialised coaches for almost every department such as strikers and set piece coaches.

Questions were raised about the depth and expertise of Chiefs’ technical team and back room staff led by head coach Arthur Zwane last season.

Zwane was a few times asked if Chiefs would consider roping in a strikers' coach, but he insisted they were happy with the technical team.

“I had the privilege to speak to [Chiefs founder and chair] Bra Kaizer Motaung and my challenge to him was, ‘Bra K, Chiefs are a big team, but you are not operating like a big team’. They still expect things to happen and yet they haven’t changed things.

“My approach was that the technical staff, the analysis [needs bolstering]. Sundowns are unbelievable when it comes to their analysis of their team and the opposition.   

“They have analysts who are all over the country analysing opposition teams. They bring reports back that help the coach prepare the session accordingly going to play each game.

“I feel like at Chiefs they have taken their foot off the pedal in that aspect whereby they just sign players and hope for them to rock up and the coach must somehow devise a training session and go play a game.”

Shongwe, a football analyst for broadcaster Supersport, played eight seasons at Amakhosi and won many trophies with the Glamour Boys in their heyday in the 1980s.

“For us it was not a question of whether we will win a cup or not. It was a question of how many,” he said.   

“We were way beyond winning the cup. Our hunger was that we deserve more and that’s why for us even winning one cup [in a season] was a big disappointment.”

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