Ajax boss: Benni was very keen to come but...

Ajax Cape Town CEO Ari Efstathiou has revealed that he had several meetings with Benni McCarthy to coach the GladAfrica Championship side.

Efstathiou was eager to lure the former Bafana Bafana striker to mentor Ajax following the sudden resignation of Andries Ulderink.

"At the time we got the resignation from Andries we were sitting two points ahead at the top (of the GladAfrica Championship). We were a little bit concerned on what the next best move would be, we didn’t want a coach who would bring strange methods," Efstathiou said, as quoted by Soccer Laduma.

"We felt at the time Benni could come in and not necessarily change what we were doing, but rather bring his management skills - his relationship with players is very good. That's what attracted us to him at the time and I had several meetings with him at the time and he was very keen to come."

McCarthy was sacked from his head coach post at Cape Town City and soon afterwards returned to Scotland to be with his wife and children, to which Efstathiou believes the reason he could not convince the 42-year-old to relocate to the Mother City again.

"But with his family being away (in Scotland), and I don't think his wife wanted to return to SA, his view that he wanted to further his career in Europe was his reasons for not coming down to us. There was never a discussion of money, we never got to it," the Ajax boss explained. 

"But I think those were the two main reasons. Nevertheless, it didn't happen, and we gave the position to Calvin (Marlin) and look at the results."

Ajax are currently top of the log with 48-points with six games left of the season remaining.

- Compiled by Tashreeq Vardien