Mamelodi Sundowns: Why the club will not part ways with player Marcelo Allende
Well-informed press reports from South Africa have revealed that Mamelodi Sundowns have no intention of letting their star midfielder, Marcelo Allende, leave the club easily at the end of this season; both the club's management and head coach Miguel Cardoso are firmly committed to keeping him.
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Allende, who arrived at Chloorkop in August 2022, is now in the final year of his deal with Sundowns and appears destined to depart as a free agent once the season wraps up.
Miguel Cardoso's opinion of the player
Cardoso and the rest of the Sundowns hierarchy would have happily tied the Chilean down to a fresh deal by now, yet the decision rests with the player himself, leaving the club in a waiting game to discover whether he intends to remain beyond the current campaign.
Speaking to the media following his team's 1-0 triumph over Golden Arrows in the Carling Knockout Cup quarter-finals, Cardoso lavished praise on the midfielder: "His consistency is remarkable, and he's maintained it over so many years. We'll give it our all, I'm quite certain, to keep him here for a long while. Watching him in training and in matches is a genuine pleasure. He's among the first through the door and among the last to leave. Match after match, he covers around 12 kilometres. Beyond the pitch, he's someone we've been fortunate to know as a person — he and his family are simply wonderful."
The coach went on to explain how such individuals become woven into the fabric of the club: "Players of that calibre become part of our environment and help to shape character and attitude. We have many of them. Marcelo, without question, lifts the level of everyone around him."