Kaizer Chiefs once dominated South African football, winning 13 league titles and 42 cups in its history.
However, the Soweto outfit hasn’t won a trophy in nearly 10 years.
To put that into context, Orlando Pirates’ rising star Relebohile Mofokeng was in the first grade.
Kaizer Chiefs decline
The last time Chiefs ended a campaign victorious was during the 2014/15 season, when they won the South African league and MTN8 cup.
At that time, Bernard Parker and Siphiwe Tshabalala caused headaches for defenders, and Amakhosi began each year as inevitable title contenders.
A lot has changed since then.
Their trophy cabinet continues to collect dust, and aside from their second-place league finish in 2020, they’ve been a boy amongst men.
Last season saw them finish 10th in the table, 37 points behind the winners, Mamelodi Sundowns.
The year prior, they concluded the season in fifth place, 26 points off the champions.
Kaizer Chiefs’ rivals continue to dominate
Mamelodi Sundowns are collecting trophies at an excessive rate, and even their bitter Sowetan rivals, Orlando Pirates, have ensured their winning tally rises with three MTN8 cups in a row and four in the last five years.
Can coach Nabi turn it around?
A sigh of relief is reverberating across the AmaKhosi faithful, who finally have something to be excited about after a decade of hurt – they’re now title contenders.
Following a disappointing 2023/24 season, Chiefs management brought in Tunisian head coach Nasreddine Nabi, who’s enjoyed a promising start to this year’s SPL, winning two games out of three and sitting sixth in the table with a game in hand on fifth-placed Polokwane City and fourth-ranked Chippa United.
Bafana Bafana’s Hugo Broos believes this is just the beginning for the reawakened Kazier Chiefs, telling iDiskiTimes, “I’m happy that Kaizer Chiefs are showing they will come again to what they were a few years ago,
“They have been very disappointing in the last two years. I think the coach who is there now is a good coach and I know him.
“I think he can change it, and he’s starting to change things already when I see Chiefs play. There’s a plan there, there’s structure. He knows what he wants.
“He’s also a guy like me, he tells things like they are. What I feel, is there’s no friendship politics anymore, you have to perform and then you get a place in the team and that’s how it has to be. So I’m very happy with what’s happening in Chiefs now,
“Let’s be honest … for a club like Chiefs to be eighth of ninth in the competition for the last two, three years, it’s not normal. It has to be… not always champions but second or third, maybe fourth… And I think they are on a good track now, so let’s hope.”
Do you think Kaizer Chiefs will turn it around?
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