Hunt celebrates 1,000th game at home to Lamontville Golden Arrows

SuperSport United coach Gavin Hunt is celebrating an unprecedented milestone of 1,000 games in charge in the topflight of the South African football.

Hunt’s 999th game in charge saw SuperSport upset Chiefs with a 4-1 away win in the Betway Premiership on Tuesday and his 1,000th game will be at home to Lamontville Golden Arrows in Pretoria on Sunday.

The previous record number of matches coached in South African football was 816, held by Gordon Igesund, the former Bafana Bafana coach.

Hunt’s three figure tally is made up of league matches, domestic cup games and matches with South African continental club competition. He has won 416 of his 999 games and seen his side score 1291 goals.

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Hunt was teenager when he debuted for Hellenic in the early 1980s after being chosen for South Africa’s schoolboys’ team at fullback. He spent most of his playing career there, save for a short spell on loan at neighbours Cape Town Spurs.

He began coaching local school teams in his 20s when he was still a player to supplement his meagre wages and was then asked to help representative junior teams in the region.

After retirement, he was coach at amateur club Vasco da Gama before joining Stars. All told his involvement in the professional game in South Africa is in its fifth decade.

The 60-year-old has coached at a club in the South African league every season since 1998, a remarkable 27-season run.

It has included four league championships, three with SuperSport between 2008-2010 and one at Bidvest Wits in 2017.

He took the Cape Town club Seven Stars, where he gave teenager Benni McCarthy his debut, to promotion in the 1998/99 season and has not missed a campaign since.

He went onto coach at Hellenic, Black Leopards, Moroka Swallows, SuperSport, Wits, Chippa United and Kaizer Chiefs before returning to SuperSport in 2022.