Bongi Msomi honoured to lead Team SA at Commonwealth Games

Many were surprised when SASCOC this week announced the recently-retired Msomi as the leader of Team SA for the multi-sport event in Glasgow scheduled for 23 July to 2 August.  

The netball legend told SABC Sport that she is ready for the challenge and determined to make a success of her new role. 

"I feel quite excited, and I know it's probably going to be one of the most challenging and demanding tasks for me, but when I stopped playing netball I knew I was probably going to have to get such opportunities," said Msomi.

"And it's always my wish to walk the path, and I think to take this on is also going to give hope to some of the athletes that will be retiring and people who trust that they can be ready for such roles, and I'm hoping to put in my best efforts to make it work."

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The 38-year-old from KwaZulu-Natal admitted that she did not expect to take on such a major role this soon after retirement and says she turned down several opportunities because she wanted to take her time before entering a new chapter. 

"Definitely not [expected]. I obviously retired in 2023, I took a gap year in 2024 and thought, 'I'm going to upskill myself' – I did a lot of leadership programmes, one called Leadership 2.0 with SuperSport, which I thought  was a fantastic one," she added.

"After that I thought to myself, 'I'm just going to study' and I did a BCom Sports and Business Management during the time I was off.

"Then only in 2025 I decided to apply for assistant coach for the [Gauteng] Fireballs, and whilst I'm active with that there are a lot of things I do in terms of coaching and being involved as a sportswoman, which is something I take pride in.

"So to get this appointment, I thought, sometimes you think you're just going to wait your turn and when you do, I guess really great opportunities come your way.

"There are a lot of things I actually said no to during the time I took a break in 2024, and I think that break was probably the best thing I've ever done, it created a platform for me to dettach from being a netball player, and really find myself so that's why I feel ready for this."