Delron Buckley says he played his best football at Arminia Bielefeld

By Nozibusiso Sibiya
10th November 2025

Former Bafana Bafana international and Arminia Bielefeld ambassador Delron Buckley says what kept him involved with Bielefeld was because of how they had always treated him like family.

Buckley played for the Bundesliga 2 side in the 2014/15 Bundesliga 1 season, scoring 15 goals in 29 appearances before moving to Borussia Dortmund.

Bielefeld does a lot of grassroots work in South Africa, having also officially launched their partnership with Bolabatha United FC this month in Johannesburg.

Buckley says he left a huge legacy at the club.

“I’m sure you’ve heard that Bielefeld is like a family club, and I left a good legacy when I played there. I was the second highest goalscorer in the Bundesliga, and it was the season where Bielefeld was playing in the Bundesliga and we were very successful,” Buckley said.

“We had an unbelievable season where we were beating Bayern Munich, where we were beating Borussia Dortmund.

“If someone asked me where the best club was, where you played your best football, it’s Bielefeld, no doubt about that.”

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Bielefeld, who secured a promotion at the end of last season from the Bundesliga 3, are currently 9th on the Bundesliga 2 standings with five wins, five losses, and two draws in 12 games this season.

Other former Bafana internationals who played for Bielfeld are Sibusiso Zuma, Rowen Fernandez, and Siyabonga Nkosi.

The 47-year-old believes that current Bafana Bafana players are not getting a lot of chances in Europe anymore because they haven’t played on the international stage like the FIFA World Cup yet.

“I think you hit the nail on the head because if you look back in my days, the majority of the players that played in the national team all played in Europe. The reason being, it’s because we qualified for the 1998 World Cup in France and that team had Lucas Radebe playing for Leeds, you had players that played in Italy, you had players that played in Spain, England, like Benny McCarthy, and of course Quinton Fortune,” he added.

“Since we hardly qualified for any World Cup since 2002, I think that’s where it became uninteresting for European clubs to look for players in South Africa.