‘Where are our 20-year-olds?’ Arendse warns about looming goalkeeping crisis for Bafana

SuperSport United assistant coach Andre Arendse is worried that soon the national team Bafana Bafana might not have a quality and reliable goalkeeper.

Currently, Mamelodi Sundowns custodian Ronwen Williams is doing the job, but at 33, he is surely at his peak. He has a couple of seasons before retiring from the international scene which might happen sooner or later.

The only South Africa-born custodian who has been delivering consistently is Orlando Pirates keeper Sipho Chaine. However, the majority of the Premier Soccer League teams have gone for foreign goalkeepers.

It is something Arendse believes might come back to haunt the national team in the future if a solution is not found.

Lack of development in the goalkeeping department?

“I don’t know if I’ve got to be careful how I say this, but I say it with all good intent; the problem we face at the moment is, and please somebody correct me if I’m wrong, that nine of our PSL clubs have foreign first-choice goalkeepers, for example,” he told the media ahead of their Nedbank Cup quarter-final game against Pirates.

“And that is no disrespect to foreign goalkeepers because I think they do add value to our game, but it is a problem for us as a local South Africa because we’re not placing a serious enough focus on developing young goalkeepers coming through.

“Our youngest local goalkeeper playing in the PSL at the moment – I stand corrected – is maybe Sipho Chaine, and I think he’s 28-29, it’s not good enough. Where are our 20-year-olds? Where are our 21-year-olds, who are playing first-team football for their clubs? So that speaks to a proper lack of development from a goalkeeping perspective,” he concluded.