Gallants coach comments on opportunity to benefit from Royal AM’s situation

Dan Malesela, head coach of relegation-threatened Marumo Gallants, has revealed whether he sees an opportunity to benefit from Royal AM’s current situation.

Thwihli Thwahla are currently unable to play as their matches were suspended by PSL “until further notice” due to the club’s inability to guarantee its financial solvency and meet its future commitments for the 2024/25 PSL season.

According to SABC Sport, the league’s motherbody is now exploring possibilities to expel the KZN club. This could prove advantageous for teams near the drop zone, given that the relegation spot would have already been determined.

Malesela dismissed any thoughts of capitalising on Royal AM’s potential expulsion and reiterated that his team’s focus is on improving its own position in the Betway Premiership table. 

MALESELA SAYS THEY WANT TO IMPROVE THEIR OWN POSITION ON THE LOG

“I’m not even thinking about that. Me, my mind doesn’t…I’m not a capitalist,” said Malesela. “I’ve never…it has never even come to my mind. My mind is based on climbing up the table. I would be a very, very poor coach, or I don’t know what the right word is.

“I would be this person who’s not ambitious if I really start thinking about how do we sit at the bottom and all of that. I’m looking at the gap of points now. As we sit and say, ‘Oh, SuperSport [United] is just above us’. If we had gotten 18 [points], then we are above them. And then now we are on 18, the other clubs have got 20. I’m looking at those things.

“But now you have to relook again. And because I didn’t want to go there and look back. Now we have to look and say, hey, how close is it? We’ve got two points and, and, and…

“I have never really thought about, ‘What if Royal AM?’ this and this and this. That would be me being worried about the relegation than being worried about climbing up the log.”

RELATED STORY: Royal AM’s legal challenge against PSL, SARS & curator rejected