Siphiwe Tshabalala appointed on Monday by South African national team coach Pitso Mosimane to captain Bafana Bafana when they face Tanzania in a friendly International game at the national stadium in Dar Es Salam on Saturday, has been given a vote of confidence by his club coach at the Amakhosi Vladimir Vermezovic who believes that Shabba is the correct choice to captain the team.

Shabba will join a list of iconic Chiefs figures the likes of Neil Tovey, Doctor Khumalo and Brian Baloyi to have had the honour of captaining Bafana Bafana, as he heads into his first full game as Bafana captain Chiefs and coach Vermezovic has come out and backed the appointment of the dreadlocked winger as skipper for the game.

“In my opinion at the moment Siphiwe Tshabalala is the best player in South Africa, in the last couple of games that he has played for us his performances have been at the highest level, in my view he is a good choice to lead the National team on Saturday. It is a well-deserved honour for him.”

Vermezovic furthermore feels that Tshabalala, who will have his Amakhosi teammates Reneilwe Letsholonyane and goalkeeper Itumeleng Khune with him in the squad to face the Taifa Stars, possesses the necessary qualities to be a good leader.

Of this the Chiefs coach said, “to be a good captain one needs to be a good people person and have good communication with your teammates and the technical team, and I do feel that Siphiwe has theses skills and that he will do a good job leading South Africa against Tanzania.”

Tshabalala will captain a mostly PSL based Bafana Bafana squad with Barnard Parker the only foreign based player in the team the teams is also without Orlando Pirates players as they are involved in the semi-finals of the Nedbank Cup this weekend, while Tanzania have said that they will include their three big name players who are based abroad.

Tanzania have made good progress in recent times and have climbed nine places in the latest FIFA rankings to a 112 and are currently second behind the Central African Republic in Qualifying Group D for the 2012 CAF Africa Cup of Nations, a group that also includes Morocco and Algeria.

Tshabalala did captain Bafana Bafana in the latter stages of their 1-0 victory over Egypt in March as he took over the captaincy late in the game from Steven Pienaar, that victory took South Africa to the top of their Qualifying Group for the 2012 nations cup.

South Africa currently ranked 39th on the FIFA World rankings and have once previously played against Tanzania, that game in 2002 ended in a 1-1 draw. Saturday’s match kicks off at 18h00 South African time.