Sundowns boss Miguel Cardoso demands referee protection after Teboho Mokoena tackle

Mamelodi Sundowns manager Miguel Cardoso has called for greater protection from match officials after Teboho Mokoena suffered a serious ankle injury during the club’s MTN8 victory over Polokwane City.

Mokoena was hurt by a heavy challenge at Lucas Moripe Stadium and was subsequently ruled out of Sundowns’ opening Betway Premiership fixture, a 3-2 win over TS Galaxy in Mbombela. The same scoreline secured victory over Polokwane City in the cup match.

Polokwane City player Surprise Mathonsi was not shown a yellow card by referee Philangenkosi Khumalo for the tackle, despite its severity. The decision prompted widespread criticism.

Mokoena is now doubtful for Sundowns’ meeting with Kaizer Chiefs at FNB Stadium on Saturday. Both sides will be aiming to maintain their perfect starts to the league campaign.

“It is important to understand Teboho Mokoena was not in this match [against TS Galaxy] and it is important for me to say South Africa must understand we have to protect our players,” Cardoso said after Sundowns’ win over Galaxy, which was secured by substitute Sphelele Mkhulise’s two goals in stoppage time.

“We cannot come from the World Cup where Teboho was a national hero [for Bafana Bafana in June], and when he is playing his first match on South African soil, we allow such aggressive action over him without it being penalised by a yellow card.

“This is the injury imposed on Teboho. It was a rough one and the player [Mathonsi] was not yellow-carded for the action.”

Cardoso said his comments were intended as a request for improved officiating rather than an attack on referees.

“We have to protect our players and this is a positive approach and not criticism. We need to protect players who want to play football. As Sundowns, we are a team that wants to play football and we play fair, even though playing fair sometimes is not enough.

“If you watched the last game [against Polokwane City] properly, at halftime there were two players of the opponent who should have been red-carded and the match would not have gone to extra time.

“Against TS Galaxy, we put more than 90-minutes on the legs and it was clear to see that Antonio van Wyk, who is not used to playing so regularly, and Tashreeq Matthews were struggling with freshness.

“We had to let Grant Kekana recover because he was absolutely tired.”

The Sundowns manager also argued that his team had been punished more heavily than some rivals during the previous season, claiming several of their yellow and red cards were questionable.

“Just to compare, we were one of the teams that had more yellow cards throughout the season. The highest one had 58 and we had 53, and if you compare with [2026-26 Premiership champions] Orlando Pirates, they had almost half our yellow cards.

“We had four red cards in actions that were less rough than the one we saw in the last match against Polokwane City. For example, Pirates had zero red cards and we had four throughout the season.”

Cardoso also renewed his call for the introduction of video assistant referees in South Africa.

“We want the games to be played the normal way, especially our games that are technical. The players in the front need be protected by referees. But they [match officials] have no help because there is no VAR.

“Unfortunately in South Africa we continue to play without VAR but throughout Africa more and more countries have it. Morocco, Egypt, Mauritania, Algeria, Ivory Coast, Tunisia have VAR.

“Even Benin and Ghana are starting experiments with VAR. But here in South Africa, we still don’t have it.”