Fresh off scoring a wonder goal for the South Africa national Under-20 team just over a week ago in a friendly international match against the Namibian Under-20’s, Chiefs rookie midfielder Mandla Masango is looking forward to playing a leading role in guiding Amajita to the African Youth Championships.

The tournament will be staged in Rwanda early next year. A top four finish in Rwanda will see South Africa through to the Fifa U-20 World Cup for the first time since 1997 - it was South Africa’s only appearance at this particular competition almost eleven years ago in Malaysia.

Masango has made a total of seven appearances for Chiefs this season, all of which have come in league games. He also famously scored on his league debut for The Amakhosi during a 2-0 win against Thanda Royal Zulu on the opening night of the current season. Given the bit part role that he has played for Chiefs through the current campaign, he believes that has helped him in his development as a player, and has made things easier for him when turning out for the national team. The training he gets with the Chiefs first team has helped him make tactical and technical improvements to his game, and has aided in him being at a high fitness level year round.

Road to Rwanda

The first aim for Masango is to come through the qualifying campaign with Amajita and make the cut as one of the final eight teams at the African Youth Championships, as he said. “Right now at club level I am getting all the help I need to be successful with the national U-20 team, the senior players in the team as well as the coach are providing me with the necessary guidance to be able to give my best for the national team. I feel that the more game time I get at Chiefs it will work in my favour when we playing in these qualifying matches, so I will work on getting regular game time at club level. Which will put me in a position to take up a strong role in helping Amajita get to Rwanda and finish off in the top four places as I would like to be at the FIFA U-20 World Cup in Egypt next year”.

Chiefs flavour

Against the Namibians, Masango was joined by two other Chiefs player in the match, first team player Bamose Gololo and Amakhosi U-19 player Bongani Sondlana also made the journey to Windhoek.

Masango believes that with a wealth of experienced young players in the Chiefs first team set up, the Amakhosi could be having five or more players with Amajita through the up coming qualifying campaign.

Masango shared his opinion on which of his team mates he felt could be joining the trio in their quest to qualify for Rwanda, “all of the Chiefs guys who played against Namibia myself, Bongani and Bamose fared well. While I am confident we will be there again for the next match I also feel that the likes of our newly promoted goalkeeper Thela Ngobeni and Sihle Mbambo have the ability and experience to add value to the team”.