Neil Robert Tovey OIS (born 2 July 1962) is a South African

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

coach and former player and also brother of former footballer Mark Tovey. He was born in

Pretoria Pretoria ( ; ) is the Capital of South Africa, administrative capital of South Africa, serving as the seat of the Executive (government), executive branch of government, and as the host to all foreign embassies to the country. Pretoria strad ...

. He holds the record for most appearances in the

National Soccer League The National Soccer League (NSL) was the top-level soccer league in Australia, run by Soccer Australia and later the Australian Soccer Association. The NSL, the A-League's predecessor, spanned 28 seasons from its inception in 1977 until its ...

Early career

Tovey was born in

but grew up in

Durban Durban ( ; , from meaning "bay, lagoon") is the third-most populous city in South Africa, after Johannesburg and Cape Town, and the largest city in the Provinces of South Africa, province of KwaZulu-Natal. Situated on the east coast of South ...

. He had been playing soccer since 1969. He aspired to be a doctor before opting to play professional football. His brother

Mark Mark may refer to: In the Bible * Mark the Evangelist (5–68), traditionally ascribed author of the Gospel of Mark * Gospel of Mark, one of the four canonical gospels and one of the three synoptic gospels Currencies * Mark (currency), a currenc ...

who was also a footballer used to give him football lessons. He was also coached at junior level at Juventus Durban by

Clive Barker Clive Barker (born 5 October 1952) is an English writer, filmmaker, and visual artist. He came to prominence in the 1980s with a series of short stories collectively named the ''Books of Blood'', which established him as a leading horror author ...

Club career

Durban City

He made his professional debut for Durban City in 1981 and won the

1982 Events January * January 1 – In Malaysia and Singapore, clocks are adjusted to the same time zone, UTC+8 (GMT+8.00). * January 13 – Air Florida Flight 90 crashes shortly after takeoff into the 14th Street Bridge in Washington, D.C. ...

and

1983 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning of the ...

NPSL titles under

and played 176 league games. Tovey was transfer listed on 12 March 1986.

AmaZulu

He scored on debut in a 2--1 win over

Arcadia Shepherds Arcadia Shepherds are a South African association football club based in Arcadia, Pretoria. It is affiliated with the Football Association of Pretoria (FAP). History The club was founded in 1903, and was briefly renamed ''Arcadia United'' in t ...

on 4 April 1986. He also scored in a 5--1 win over

Kaizer Chiefs Kaizer Chiefs Football Club (often known as Chiefs) is a South African professional football club based in Naturena, Johannesburg South, that plays in the Premiership. The team is nicknamed ''AmaKhosi'', which means "Kings" or "Chiefs" in Zu ...

on 8 June 1986 in what became Chiefs' worst loss ever. He stayed until 1989 and played 117 league games.

Kaizer Chiefs

He joined Chiefs in 1990 and took over captaincy from Howard Freese in 1992 wearing the number 9 jersey. In the same season, Tovey got a record 52 starts which is still a record. He was converted to defence by

Philippe Troussier Philippe Omar Troussier,October's ten – Religious conversions
...

. He led Chiefs to cup victory scored two very important goals in the Rothmans Cup against QwaQwa Stars and

Umtata Bush Bucks Bush Bucks is a South African soccer club. The club was founded in 1957 and originally based in Mthatha in the Eastern Cape. In 2001, the team moved to East London. It was nicknamed ''Imbabala (The Bucks)''. History The club was formed by a fo ...

. He played 341 league games for Chiefs. He played 362 matches and scored 32 goals in all competitions. In the very last match of his career and his last two touches Chiefs colours resulted in a goal in a 5–1 win over Dynamos on 9 June 1999.

International career

Tovey played for

South Africa national football team The South Africa national soccer team represents South Africa in men's international soccer and is run by the South African Football Association, the governing body for soccer in South Africa. Nicknamed Bafana Bafana (The Boys in Zulu), the ...

and won 52 caps without scoring. He captained the team 29 times.

Coaching career

Tovey coached Banyana Banyana to a

COSAFA Cup The COSAFA Cup (known fully as COSAFA Senior Challenge Cup) is an annual tournament for teams from Southern Africa organized by Council of Southern Africa Football Associations (COSAFA), inaugurated after the ban against the Republic of Sout ...

win in 2002. Tovey saved Hellenic from relegation in the 2003–04 season. He got his

UEFA The Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; ; ) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs football, futsal and beach soccer, beach football in Europe and the List of transcontinental countries#A ...

A licence with a 90% pass in

Hennef Hennef (Sieg) () is a town in the Rhein-Sieg district of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is situated on the river Sieg (river), Sieg, approx. south-east of Siegburg and east of Bonn. Hennef is the fourth-biggest town in the Rhein-Sieg-Kreis ...

, Germany, which were the best marks since 1998. On 27 June 2015 Tovey became technical director of

Personal life

Tovey lives in

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and Xhosa language, Xhosa: eGoli ) (colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, Jo'burg or "The City of Gold") is the most populous city in South Africa. With 5,538,596 people in the City of Johannesburg alon ...

with his wife Nadine Tovey and has three children, Bianca (b. 1991), Jessica (b. 1993) and Sheldon (b. 1997). His second daughter Jessica was a Miss Teen SA finalist in 2011 where

Tyra Banks Tyra Lynne Banks (born December 4, 1973), also known as BanX, is an American model, television personality, producer, writer, and actress. Born in Inglewood, California, she began her career as a model at the age of 15 and was the first Black A ...

shared a picture of her on

Instagram Instagram is an American photo sharing, photo and Short-form content, short-form video sharing social networking service owned by Meta Platforms. It allows users to upload media that can be edited with Social media camera filter, filters, be ...

. Sheldon wears a hearing aid and has impaired speech because oxygen was cut off from his brain after being burnt by scalding water in 1998. On 23 February 2015, Tovey was admitted to ICU after suffering from three

heart attack A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when Ischemia, blood flow decreases or stops in one of the coronary arteries of the heart, causing infarction (tissue death) to the heart muscle. The most common symptom ...

s during a game of squash. Tovey suffered a further heart attack in October 2016, and was admitted to hospital.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Tovey, Neil South African men's soccer players South African soccer managers South Africa men's international soccer players AmaZulu F.C. players Living people 1962 births Kaizer Chiefs F.C. players 1997 FIFA Confederations Cup players Soccer players from Pretoria South African people of English descent 1996 African Cup of Nations players Mamelodi Sundowns F.C. managers AmaZulu F.C. managers Hellenic F.C. managers Men's association football central defenders Alumni of Northwood School, Durban White South African people 20th-century South African sportsmen