Siphiwe Tshabalala along with his two Chiefs teammates Itumeleng Khune and Moketi Tsotetsi joined up with the Bafana Bafana squad on Monday morning in preparation for a friendly match on Tuesday evening against Zimbabwe.

A very happy man as he looks to consolidate his future in Carlos Alberto Parreira’s team, as he managed to put one over his former team Free State Stars on Sunday, Tshabalala played a key role in Chiefs win. When The Amakhosi were up he gave his former team mates the run around with his dazzling trickery, which brought wild cheers from the Amakhosi faithful at the Charles Mopeli Stadium. He heads off to add to his international caps in buoyant mood and is hoping to keep up the good form against Zimbabwe on Tuesday, and repeat it with a copy cat performance against Ajax in the Nedbank Cup opener on Friday evening in Durban.

Old friends

The weekend victory meant that Chiefs completed the double over Free State Stars in the league this season. The Amakhosi have scored a total of seven goals in the two league matches they played against them this season. While Tshabalala missed the October match, he was very much part of the action on Sunday, and reveled in the glory of putting one over his old team. “I enjoyed the match a lot, going back to the Free State to play against Stars was emotional for me” he explained to kaizerchiefs.com and he went on to say “being able to play the way we did was wonderful. Winning the game would have been nice, but winning the way you did against a former team is excellent. Overall it was a great game played in a good spirit and I enjoyed every minute of it”.

Up for the Cup

Siphiwe also helped Chiefs lift the Telkom Knockout Cup earlier in the season and he is now preparing to make an assault on the Nedbank Cup when Chiefs face Ajax in the opening round in Durban on Friday evening. He believes the victory of his old team was just what Chiefs needed, “Cup football is different to the league we know that but it always helps to go into matches with your confidence and morale up. I believe this win over Stars has done a lot of good for us with such a tough opponent on the horizon, it is up to us to carry on and put up the same kind of spirited and committed display that we did on Sunday”.