Orbit College head coach Pogiso Makhoye claims Monnapule Saleng’s move to Mamelodi Sundowns caught him by surprise.
The 28-year-old winger was on loan to Orbit from Pirates until the end of the season. Last week, he made a shock move to Sundowns, ending his three-year stay with the Buccaneers.
During his loan spell at Orbit College, Saleng netted three times and provided two assists.
Saleng leaves Orbit for Sundowns, coach reacts
“We are still trying to find ourselves now because we didn’t see it coming. We thought we’ll have him until the end of the season, but you know football, you sleep today as an Orbit player, when you wake up tomorrow, you are somewhere else. But this one we didn’t see it coming,” Makhoye told Soccer Laduma.
“I think we won’t take this as a negative impact because you see it means we are doing something right, because if you check even the stats. It’s repeated in the number of goals that he scored and also in terms of assists.
Makhoye said the club takes Saleng’s move to Sundowns as a positive rather than a betrayal.
“It means we help him to still stay at the top and stay relevant as well. And it’s motivating other players to say but if the stats that made here where we helped him. It means can happen to anyone,” he added.
“So we took it as a positive thing rather than negative because I think we are also having back the players that were injured are coming back, so it’s like we’ve got new signings.”
Saleng’s move to Sundowns was similar to that of Teko Modise, who also left Orlando Pirates to join Masandawana during the January transfer period. Both players had also gone AWOL at Pirates before switching to Sundowns.