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Notoane cites poor support from Safa and PSL as he resigns as SA U-23 coach

Sazi Hadebe Sports reporter
David Notoane has stepped down as South Africa Under-23 part-time coach.
David Notoane has stepped down as South Africa Under-23 part-time coach.
Image: Lefty Shivambu/Gallo Images

Part-time South Africa Under-23 coach David Notoane has resigned from his post, citing poor support from the Premier Soccer League (PSL) and his employers, the South African Football Association (Safa), for the team's failure to reach the U-23 Africa Cup of Nations.

Notoane stood down on Wednesday night after failing to take the team to this year's eight-team U-23 Nations Cup in Morocco where they would have competed for a place in next year's Paris Olympics.

Notoane leaves after his team were eliminated by Congo on away goals with a 0-0 draw in Brazzaville on Monday in the third and final qualifying round. The South Africans drew 1-1 in the first leg at Dobsonville Stadium.

The coach, who worked on a part-time basis for the junior national team while being employed full-time as a youth coach for Mamelodi Sundowns, announced his departure on Robert Marawa's Marawa Sports Worldwide show on 947, which is also streamed on SowetanLIVE. 

“I lost some key matches in my career as a coach, but this one is up there on the list. We failed in the call of duty to serve the country and therefore we failed millions of people,” Notoane said, reading a prepared statement.

“It's a huge dishonour to South African football and we apologise to the people of the country.”

Notoane identified mistakes made in the qualifying campaign that he hopes will be put right to avoid future failures.

“The U-23s had a lot off-field challenges to navigate in this qualification campaign. Three key areas put us where we are today and hopefully there are lessons well learnt. 

“[The first is] the team-building process and preparation. This generation missed out at U-17 and U-20 level in continental competitions with very few competitive matches [played] to gain experience.

“We got caught in this round of matches. [One reason is] the lack of proper support off the field when we started the process. For example, one late engagement with PSL to support the U-23 programme, which the PSL has a copy of to this day.

“Second, the need to monitor the overseas-based players was met with inaction [from Safa]. The need for junior teams to be active has been echoed. The U-23 is a bridging programme for Bafana but it's treated like a development team. This team spends a long time inactive.

“I want to thank the [Safa] president, Danny Jordaan, and technical committee for the confidence I was given to lead this team again after the challenges of Tokyo 2020 [Olympics].

“Thanks to [Sundowns' owners] the Motsepe family and Mamelodi Sundowns FC for affording me the opportunity to perform national duties. 

“Thanks to the PSL clubs and coaches that were with me during the difficult and good times. We fought the good fight to qualify but fell short with some young emerging talents — [Kgaogelo] Chauke, [Mdudzi] Shabalala, [Jayden] Adams, to name a few. My technical report will be submitted in due course.”

Notoane confirmed he did not have a contract with Safa.

“It's an end of a service, really, to put in bluntly. I'm stepping down. I think the journey is over because when things don't go well at this level — part of accountability and responsibility starts with me and I saw it fit that maybe I should give the platform to someone to come in  and take the baton forward.” 

Notoane qualified the U-23s for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics where they exited in the first round without winning a match having had shoddy preparations for an event delayed by Covid-19 to 2021. 

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