BACKIN BUSINESS

Thembinkosi Lorch was named the top player in the Premier Soccer League after the 2018/19 season, but a succession of injuries and loss of form have seen his career stall. Could he be getting back to his best?  

- Mazola Molefe

In 2019, attacking midfielder Thembinkosi Lorch was walking on water, voted Players' Player of the Year by his peers and then Footballer of the Season by the Premier Soccer League's topflight coaches.

These accolades put pressure on Stuart Baxter, then Bafana Bafana's. coach, to include Lorch in his Africa Cup of Nations squad to Egypt, and when the Englishman ignored the player in all three group stage matches, the criticism that came finally forced his hand.

Baxter, thinking he may be throwing Lorch in at the deep end, named the Orlando Pirates talisman in his starting line-up for the national team's roundof-16 clash against the hosts in one of the biggest games of the tournament.

And that produced a fairy-tale ending ... a Lorch winner five minutes before the referee blew for full time propelled. South Africa to the quarter-finals of the continental competition.