Ahead of the 2021/22 season, Kaizer Chiefs made a massive investment to bring Keagan Dolly back to Mzansi after the expiration of his contract with Montpellier. At the time, it felt like a major coup for a club looking to improve on an eighth-place finish in the previous campaign under a transfer ban. As we edge towards three years at the Naturena-based club for the highly-rated attacker, The Soweto Giants must decide whether or not to renew his contract. We look at whether this would represent a good decision for the club from a financial perspective and in terms of what he brings on the pitch. Could they decide to part ways with him and be left ruing their decision if he excels elsewhere? In this feature, Soccer Laduma investigates a tricky decision for the Glamour Boys to navigate.
Has the risk paid off?
When Keagan Dolly was signed, it carried a risk for Kaizer Chiefs for four different reasons. Firstly, he had not played regular football in almost five years as his time at Montpellier saw injuries and other factors limit his minutes. From January 2017 when he signed for the French club, until June 2021 when his deal expired, Dolly had 22 starts and 42 substitute outings to show for his time in the South of France. Basically, he was averaging 500-odd minutes per season. The player’s injury record was another red flag as it played a part in his lack of regular minutes on the Mediterranean Sea. Chiefs knew he wasn’t necessarily a durable player who would play every week. Then we had the fact that he wasn’t even that experienced in the local game with just 89 appearances in the top-flight and a best-ever goal return of four strikes in a season. That’s a similar number of outings in the big league to Yusuf Maart, who was renowned as a late bloomer. The final possible red flag was that he was returning to local shores in the first place. Surely a 28-year-old playing in a big five league could at least have moved to Belgium or the Netherlands. With the massive pay packet he was able to demand, one could question whether it may lead to a lack of hunger.
