South Africa captain Lucas Radebe has announced he is planning to quit Bafana Bafana "very soon".

Radebe, who is the only player from SA's 1995 return to international football still in the side, said he was making the decision in order to prolong his career with his club Leeds United.

Radebe has two years reaming on his contract with the English Premiership club and said he felt he was no longer able maintain his level of performance given SA's number of international fixtures.

"I won't be playing for South Africa as much now," Radebe told the Yorkshire Post newspaper.

"I think I will be cutting off and reducing my games so that I can finish gradually at international level."

Radebe said he had considered stopping immediately, but he changed his mind because of his love for Bafana Bafana.

"I have thought about quitting straight away so that I can focus on playing solely for Leeds United, but the difficult part for me is to just one day say `I am no longer going to be part of the side any more," he said.

"The best thing for me to do is to play a couple more games and have one match where I tell people that it will be my last ever game for my country.

"I don't think that will be very long in coming, it will be very soon indeed."