Hugo Broos has explained why he believes Mamelodi Sundowns have potentially priced Teboho Mokoena out of a move to Europe, fowling reports of a €5 million price tag on the Bafana Bafana man.
Mokoena was one of the standout performers for the national side at the Africa Cup of Nations in Ivory Coast earlier this year as they returned with a bronze medal.
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Most had expected that the box-to-box midfielder would be one of the players making a move abroad following his sterling performances.
However, he instead penned a fresh five-year deal with Sundowns.
Speaking to media last Thursday after announcing his 23-man squad for the 2025 AFCON qualifiers against Congo, Broos explained that if recent reports and claims by agent Lance Davids were true, then Mokoena may be out-priced for European teams.
"Mokoena played a very good AFCON; there was interest [from overseas]," said Broos.
"But then now, if it is true they [Sundowns] asked for €5 million (+-R95 million) for him, nobody, nobody will pay €5 million for Mokoena. Nobody.
"Why? Because he is only ... excuse me that I'm expressing myself like this ... he is only a South African footballer.
"We don't have any history of South African footballers playing abroad for a long time now.
"You see, in other countries, such as Senegal, Morocco and Ivory Coast, they all have players abroad, but we don't anymore, so we need this.
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"We can achieve that by having good results with the national team because you see what happens after AFCON, suddenly there was interest.
"But we are on a good way, but we are still not there where we want to be," added the Belgian.
Despite finding game-time hard to come by under new coach Manqoba Mngqithi, the former SuperSport United star has been selected to the Bafana squad to do duty against Congo at the Nelson Mandela Stadium on Friday.
The return fixture is next week Tuesday away from home.