Axed Phuti Mohafe opens up about "unfortunate" Marumo Gallants exit

Bahlabane Ba Ntwa overhauled their technical team after a disappointing start to the 2026/27 Betway Premiership season, parting ways with Mohafe and assistant Musa Bilankulu.

The club confirmed the changes on Wednesday after Mohafe oversaw a winless opening to the campaign, collecting just two points from five matches.

Second assistant coach Trevor Mathiane stepped into the role on an interim basis before the club announced Ronnie Kanalelo as their new mentor going forward.

Mohafe had only joined Gallants this season after three successful campaigns with Polokwane City but now finds himself out of a job with the entire season still to play.

The coach told iDiski Times: "I don't know how to put it, but I can say it was a hectic week for me.

"And with whatever that has transpired last week, I wasn't that, how can I say this? I didn't expect that news because of the timing of the season and the matches that we played.

"But I couldn't complain more because I couldn't control what the board came up with in terms of the decision they made.

"I can say there were words of courage and words of support, but the moment that happened, you could see that this wasn't planned.

"In fact, I can say based on the performance of the team, I couldn't see it coming because, yes, we didn't play that well on the first, the second, and the third match, but the team started to pick up on the third match.

"It was so unfortunate that when we picked up on the third match, we played against Sundowns. So, the strategy that I used didn't suit the playing style of the team. But going forward on the fourth match, that is where you could see a lot of positives in what we have been implementing into the team, and the integration was starting to show because you could see how Marumo used to play and how the coach wants to play.

"So, scoring four goals in two matches, that was a lot of improvement from the club and the performance itself, in how the players were playing on the day. That shows that there is a lot of improvement."