Kaizer Chiefs burgeoning youngster Mduduzi Shabalala has expressed his
gratitude to the club for giving him a “challenge” after he snubbed his
childhood team, Orlando Pirates. The 19-year old has enjoyed a meteoric
rise at Amakhosi, quickly rising from the development structures to the
first team at the beginning of the season.
Shabalala has already established himself in Arthur Zwane’s regular
line-up and scored his second goal for the senior team in Chiefs’ 3-2 loss
to Golden Arrows. Ahead of the Soweto Derby over the weekend, Shabalala
revealed that he grew up supporting Pirates, but had to switch allegiances
after joining Chiefs.
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“I was supporting Orlando Pirates, everyone at home is supporting Orlando
Pirates but now since I’ve joined Kaizer Chiefs I had to change and
support Kaizer Chiefs and I will die as a Kaizer fan,” Shabalala told
journalists at a press conference.
The teenage forward went on to say that he has since influenced other
members of his family to support Chiefs, but his father refuses to change
allegiance.
“Old lady, sisters and kids but (father), he refuses, even now he says
(Pirates) will beat (Chiefs), I don’t understand,” he said.
Shabalala detailed his journey coming up as a youngster and revealed that
he went to trials at Pirates, but felt that he needed a better challenge,
which he got at Chiefs.
“Coach Sfiso played a big role in my life, he’s the one who took me to
Kaizer Chiefs. Firstly we started to trial at Orlando Pirates but it
didn’t work out, I told him that it’s easy there at Pirates, I want to go
to Kaizer Chiefs,” he explained.
“At Kaizer Chiefs they made it difficult for me, I trialed for about three
to four months in a trial and I told him that’s what I want in football. I
want a challenge and it happened that I got the challenge and I was
promoted to the reserve team.
He went on to describe his success in the Gauteng Development League with
the under-17s, as well as his Player of the Tournament award at the
national team level. After that, he was promoted to the senior team.
