PITSO Mosimane should have been fired a long time ago as Bafana Bafana coach and it is not difficult to see why Gordon Igesund and Gavin Hunt are being widely touted as favourites for the job.
This is the honest and practical view of the under-performing national team's most successful coach to date, Clive Barker, after Mosimane finally got the bullet from his concerned paymasters at the SA Football Association (Safa) on Monday night.
He has been temporarily replaced by Steve Komphela for this weekend's crucial assignment in Gaborone, a World Cup qualifier against Botswana.
Barker believes that 48-year-old Mosimane was lucky not to have been axed after the "Bomb of Mbombela" in October, when he notoriously miscalculated Bafana's qualification for the 2012 African Nations Cup finals and made the country the laughing stock of the football world.
If Mosimane had better principles as a coach, he would have resigned at that stage, according to Barker (pictured).
At worst, he should have stepped down straight after Sunday's come-from-behind stalemate with lowly Ethiopia at Royal Bafokeng Sports Palace instead of forcing the emergency committee of Safa to act on his seven-match winless run and hold a meeting at Royal Marang Hotel in Phokeng near Rustenburg, with both parties agreeing to part ways amicably in the best interests of the country and the national team.
Mosimane, rumoured to have earned around R800 000 a month as the successor to the even more expensive Carlos Alberto Parreira, registered more draws than anything else during his tenure, in addition to failing to qualify for the latest Nations Cup finals and fuelling concerns at Safa that he might also fail to qualify Bafana for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.
"He had plenty of time to prove himself, having been part of the Bafana set-up for four years or so as either assistant coach, caretaker coach or head coach," said Barker. — Cape Argus.