S'fiso Hlanti with Kaizer Chiefs teammates

Hlanti will miss the Soweto derby on 5 March 2022 due to injury

Kaizer Chiefs defender not ready to return after layoff

Kaizer Chiefs coach Arthur Zwane says that defender Sifiso Hlanti isn’t over his injury which the player described as like being shot in the leg.

S'fiso Hlanti with Kaizer Chiefs teammates

Hlanti will miss the Soweto derby on 5 March 2022 due to injury

Kaizer Chiefs coach Arthur Zwane says that defender Sifiso Hlanti isn’t over his injury which the player described as like being shot in the leg.

Hlanti ruptured his Achilles tendon during training back in November 2021.

Physically Hlanti is fit and ready to go, but Zwane says that the injury has left the player a little short of his best.

Kaizer Chiefs star struggling after ‘gunshot’ injury

Sifiso Hlanti Kaizer Chiefs
Sifiso Hlanti. Picture: Sydney Mahlangu/BackapagePix

The state of affairs has left Kaizer Chiefs looking thin down their left and may encourage them to deploy a back three instead with Erick Mathoho a candidate to fill the left centre back role.

“Unfortunately, on the left, we only have [Austin] Dube and we also thinking of Hlanti, that he can play there, but looking at Hlanti at the moment I don’t see him being available anytime soon,” Zwane said at the DStv Premiership launch in Randburg.

“Yes, he is training with the boys but in his mind, you can see he still has that bit of fear. He is sometimes pulling out of tackles, so we are trying to manage him. We don’t want to rush him and then we end up hurting him even more so we will try to manage him with that gradually but with the hope that he will get back to his full fitness levels where we can be able to have that confidence in him that he has in himself.

“At the moment he has a bit of fear, if he gets injured again he is thinking about the age he is thinking about many other things, so that is why its key for us to manage and build him steadily and make sure that when the time is right we give him the opportunity to play. With him, the chances are slim because should anything happen to Dube then we wont have that left centre back, so that means we have to take one of the right-footed centre backs to the left and that way you won’t have a balanced team at the back but we will see.

“Maybe we will start like that and see if it works and if it does, then we continue while we are looking, but if it doesn’t work, we will be forced to quickly bring one on board,” he concluded.

Soccer Laduma

It is unclear when Hlanti will be match-ready.