Hugo Broos hopes to extend career with World Cup victory

MONTERREY, Mexico — One match possibly stands between South Africa head coach Hugo Broos and the end of nearly 40 years of coaching across the game.

Bafana Bafana face South Korea on Wednesday, June 24, in a match the Broos-led side needs to win to definitively keep its World Cup hopes alive.

For Broos, the match comes with personal and national stakes. A win for South Africa would not only put it in the knockout stages for the first time, but it would also continue the Belgian’s coaching career.

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“I don’t want to be remembered for how long,” Broos, who plans to retire after South Africa’s 2026 World Cup run, said at a press conference on Tuesday. “I want to be remembered for what I’ve done.”

The 74-year-old has coached across multiple continents, starting in Belgium in 1988 and working his way through Europe and African national teams.

Broos has said his decision comes down to his age, fatigue from the daily push of football, and the desire to spend more time with his family.

Broos has done much for South Africa since his arrival in 2021. The last time South Africa played in the World Cup was in 2010, when it automatically qualified as the host country.

Broos' first coaching stops in Belgium were Anderlecht and Genk, before he moved to Turkey with Trabzonspor in 2008.

He coached Cameroon in 2017, leading that country to its fifth AFCON trophy. In 2023, he led Bafana Bafana to their second-ever COSAFA Cup.

Now, all his work for the side can be capped on the biggest stage in world soccer with one standout performance.

“It motivates us a lot,” Broos said. “It can be historical for South Africa. It is a big motivation for us to do it (June 24) and win the game.”

Brooks Thomason is a student in the University of Georgia’s Carmical Sports Media Institute.

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