South Africa coach Hugo Broos says he is not bothered about becoming the oldest coach at a World Cup when he takes Bafana Bafana to next year’s finals in North America.
Broos will be 74 years, two months and one day old when the finals kick off on 11 June next year, easily beating the record of 71 years that the German coach Otto Rehhagel set in 2010 when he took Greece to the finals in South Africa.
“Is that something to be proud of?” Broos asked Belgian media in the aftermath of South Africa beating Rwanda in Nelspruit on Tuesday to qualify for the finals.
“That’s something that is interesting for those who follow these things but it doesn’t interest me because I want to do more. I want to achieve and to show that perhaps I have had a good career in the game,” he said.
Broos has made no secret of the fact that he was seeking to return to the World Cup again after being a player with Belgium in 1986 when they reached the semifinal in Mexico. After that, he intends to retire.
Broos is also the first Belgian to coach another national team to the World Cup, but he said he was not keen to be drawn with his home country in the same group at the tournament.
“I’d rather not. I would not enjoy that because it will be hard to coach against Belgium. But if we must, then we must, of course. In that case, we won’t give (Belgium) any gifts,” he said.
Broos is already South Africa’s longest serving coach and will become the first to take the team to two separate Africa Cup of Nations finals.
At each of South Africa’s previous finals tournaments, they have had different coaches with Clive Barker (1996), Jomo Sono (1998), Trott Moloto (2000), Carlos Queiroz (2002), Styles Phumo (2004), Ted Dumitru (2006), Carlos Alberto Parreira (2008), Gordon Igesund (2013), Ephraim Mashaba (2015), and Stuart Baxter (2019).
With Broos, Bafana reached the semifinals and then took the bronze medal at the last edition in Ivory Coast.