South Africa coach Pitso Mosimane says he is confident Thabang Matuludi can do a job at right back for his side in this month’s Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers, even if he only played his first game of the season on Saturday.
The new Mamelodi Sundowns signing competed against Saudi Arabian club Al Hilal in the Inter-Continental Cup in Pretoria on Saturday in his debut since moving from Polokwane City, where he did not feature in the first six weeks of the campaign.
But with Khuliso Mudau seriously injured, Mosimane has limited options at right back and on Monday said he was confident in the ability of the 27-year-old Matuludi, who was a back-up in the World Cup squad in June.
“Sometimes you need to have a little bit of a sangoma next to you, right? To predict and tell you what you do and I know that, somewhere, somehow, someone's going to say, ‘why are you picking a player who's not playing, right?’,” Mosimane told a press conference.
“We did our research. I've watched him. I know he's been training the whole preseason. He has played few friendly games in the preseason.
“It's important that the players must know that if they train and they're doing things we are watching, we know what's happening. We don't just arrogantly choose a Matuludi because we want to put him in.
“Unfortunately, as a coach, you know how it is. In our jobs you've got to make choices before, right? But for football fans they are wiser after. If it was right or wrong, and if it's wrong, we know that we're going get a grilling. And if you are right … that's why we are coaches.
“So, yeah, we did our research, I've followed Matuludi all the way. I don't want to be sounding smart here, but Matuludi was at the World Cup, right? He was already there, the previous coach had him in the squad.
“And now he played a cup final on Saturday (for Sundowns), and I think it was a decent performance to show that he's a decent player, but he needs to fight for the position,” added Mosimane.