South African football legend and former Manchester United striker coach Benni McCarthy has opened up on how close he was to joining one of the Soweto giants as head coach and how the move fell through.
McCarthy became a free agent after parting ways with the English side Manchester United at the end of his contract in June. Since then, multiple reports have linked Bafana Bafana's all-time leading goalscorer with a return to South African shores on a coaching job.
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McCarthy was linked with Chiefs who eventually went for Nasreddine Nabi and Mamelodi Sundowns who appointed Manqoba Mngqithi as head coach after Rulani Mokwena's exit.
While the Cape Flats-born star has insisted that there were no formal talks with either Sundowns or Chiefs, McCarthy has now revealed he did in fact hold talks with Pirates chairman Irvin Khoza several years back about taking over head coach of The Buccaneers.
"There was [a chance] once upon a time, way before Jose Riveiro came to Pirates," McCarthy revealed on Radio2000's Game On.
"I think it was the Swedish coach [Kjell Jonevret]. I did speak with the chairman [Dr Irvin Khoza].
"It was almost a done deal; it was kind of me going back to coach the Orlando Pirates. But I think the Chairman at the last minute decided to go for someone with more experience because, like I said, I didn't have a lot of coaching experience.
"I think I would have done an amazing job because of the players Pirates had at the time. Not even Sundowns could have come close.
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"But Sundowns had coach Pitso [Mosimane] then and were able to achieve everything they have done because they were coached properly by a proper coach and If was given that opportunity to coach Pirates, it would have been fireworks."
But unfortunately, that was the closest I came to coaching Pirates after that, it was just always rumours.
"People were connecting me to coaching Pirates and Chiefs. When there is a vacancy my name gets thrown in, but I think it was also to attract other coaches when it looked like Benni McCarthy is close to signing for one of those two teams."