Agent confirms Nurkovic's move to City is off

The agent of former Kaizer Chiefs striker Samir Nurkovic, Dajan Simac, has confirmed that his client will no longer be joining Cape Town City as talks between the two parties have broken down, also dismissing reports that the Serb has a niggling injury, hence teams have been shunning him.

In September 2021, while he was still at Chiefs, Nurkovic went under the knife to repair a damaged cartilage in his right knee, missing 14 league matches of the 2021/22 season in the process. Amakhosi released the Serbian striker in July last year with Royal AM snatching him as a free-agent some seven months later.

Royal also dumped the now 31-year-old three months later, albeit, unlawfully, prompting him to take the matter to Fifa, which banned the KZN side from registering players until they pay him R12m.

Nurkovic was said to be on the verge of joining City after training with them when they returned for pre-season last month. However, the Mother City-based outfit and the Serb couldn’t agree on a deal, hence the potential transfer collapsed, according to Simac, who also allayed fear that Nurkovic hasn’t really recovered from the knee injury from two years ago.

“The Cape Town City deal is dead because we couldn’t find an agreement. It’s unfortunate because initially it looked like he was going to sign but we ended up not finding each other. At the moment we have nothing on the table [referring to new offers],” Simac told Sowetan.

“I know there have been reports that Samir has a niggling injury from a long time ago and that’s not true. He’s fit and ready to deliver again. It’s unfortunate that some teams seem skeptical about giving him a contract now. Samir has always been a hard-worker and he’s been putting in the work behind the scenes to keep shape while he’s still looking for a team.”