Chippa United chairman Siviwe Mpengesi has opted to keep Morgan Mammila at the club but also opted to bring Kurt Lentjies to support him.
Lentjies did not approve of working with Daine Klate when the fine former winger was appointed as new head coach at the beginning of the season.
The decision came after Lentjies saved the Eastern Cape-based side from relegation last season, even making an appearance in the final match to retire professionally, while being the caretaker coach in that time.
The former Maritzburg United captain was appointed on the interim when he was a player in November 2021 after Gavin Hunt was first suspended before he was sacked by the club.
As soon as last season ended, trouble brewed at Chippa as it was reported that Lentjies did not want to work as Klate’s assistant coach.
When Chippa beat AmaZulu in September in Durban, Mpengesi said Lentjies was found guilty of improper conduct and the club has no relationship with him anymore.
But at Chippa, having won four games on the bounce under Mammila – who replaced Klate in September, the honeymoon is over.
They have not won in seven matches, after they got a draw against Royal AM at Chatsworth Stadium over the weekend, with the club last winning a match was in October against Sekhukhune United.
That has led Mpengesi to bring back Lentjies in the set-up of the club.
“Lentjies is always my child,” Mpengesi told iDiski Times.
“We football people, we are forgiving people. This is Kurt’s home. The way we ended things at the beginning of the season was not a nice way, so we sat down with him and smoked the peace pipe and he’s coming now and he wants to bring that experience.
“The majority of these players, 90 percent of these players, are players who were recruited by him – he understands them.”
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Mpengesi, in bringing back Lentjies, said he did not want to fire Mammila because “he is a good story for the club”.
“So we don’t want to look like a confused team because if you bring someone in and you fire [Mammila] and you bring someone else in, you are starting all over again,” he said.
“I sat down with my board and we thought there was a need for Morgan, because of his inexperience, let us not put a lot of pressure on him. Instead let us support him, because Morgan Mammila is a good story for us.
“It will be a sad day the team will decide to fire him and we said ‘no, let’s support him’ and here he is today, he still got his role, focusing on specific areas.
“Some teams are doing well because the coaches and technical team believe in a certain system and that system, if players understand it very well, the players respond very well and the team wins.
“We thought while they are doing well, they are lacking there and there and that’s why Lentjies is back.”
Following a draw with Royal AM, Chippa are lying ninth in the DStv Premiership table with 21 points after 18 matches.
