Chippa United’s long-serving forward Andile Mbenyane says the constant changing of coaches at the club is not a problem for the players. Mbenyane in particular has become immune to being affected by coaching changes having seen close to 20 men stand in front of him as head coaches, either on a permanent or temporary basis since he arrived at the club from Ikapa Sporting upon its formation in 2009. The list of trainers that Mbenyane has called coach includes Dan Malesela, Roger Sikhakhane, Kosta Papic, Ernst Middendorp, Mich d’Avray, Velile Dyaloyi, Mark Harrison, Ian Palmer, Vladislav Heric, Manqoba Mngqithi, Julius Dube, Farouk Abrahams, Wilfred Mugeyi, Michael Lukhubeni, Duran Francis, Mlungisi Ngubane and current caretaker Mbuyiselo Sambu. 

“The thing of changing coaches is not a problem to us as players because we players we still have to play,” argues Mbenyane who will most likely see another new man coming in soon. “We are not doing this for the coaches, the coaches do play their role because we depend on them but sometimes they do their job at training and when it comes to the day of the match we must do our job. So this thing of the changes makes no difference because we still have the coach who was with coach Dan which means things are still the same. We are still pushing as players and as players we must put our minds there and realise that things are going down now and we have to work hard so that we can come up,” explains Mbenyane. With Chippa’s stay in the PSL not secured as yet, they will be playing to avoid the drop at the tail end of this campaign – which awkwardly still has the possibility of silverware hanging in their faces after they reached the semi-finals of the Nedbank Cup.