Kaizer Chiefs coach Arthur Zwane has admitted that conceding early goals remains a huge problem for Amakhosi and said this weakness must be addressed ahead of their match against Swallows FC on Wednesday night.
In their MTN8 semi-final match at the weekend, Chiefs found themselves trailing AmaZulu as early as the 14th minute when Usuthu opened the scoring via the boot of Gabadinho Mhango.
The Malawian international caught the Chiefs rear-guard flatfooted and swept the ball past goalkeeper Itumeleng Khune.
Amakhosi are always having a slow start and they have conceded early goals on numerous occasions, something that needs urgent intervention, because it always puts the Glamour Boys on the backfoot.
“After conceding, it [was] a wake-up call again, which is now a worrying factor, as you know that we’ve been working on starting on a high note. After their [AmaZulu] goal, we showed some aggression and gave a little bit of a fight,” Zwane told the media after the 1-1 draw against Usuthu.
“We then created a number of chances but we could not capitalise. In the second half, we came back stronger, but again we were not clinical enough to make our life easy going into the second round [of the competition late in October].
“We are always starting very slow and we gave them the time and space to play on the ball in their build-ups. From those build-ups, you could see it was a warning, they had about two chances that they could have capitalised on before they scored the goal.”
Chiefs, who have won a mere three games and have recorded 11 points out of a possible 24, will meet a Swallows side that is coached by up-and-coming mentor Musa Nyatama.
Nyatama is tipped to take over on a full-time basis as the club is struggling financially to get another coach.
The former midfield maestro replaced Dylan Kerr who was fired following a string of poor results that saw the Birds being dragged into the relegation quagmire. The straw that broke the camel was when they were hammered 4-0 by Golden Arrows in one of their worst performances since the season started over a month ago.
Swallows are sitting in a precarious position 14 on the PSL log table and further losses could make life difficult for them. Last season, they escaped the relegation chop by a whisker when they survived the play-offs.
For the latest sports news from Sunday World, click here.
Follow @SundayWorldZA on Twitter and @sundayworldza on Instagram, or like our Facebook Page, Sunday World, by clicking here for the latest breaking news in South Africa. To Subscribe to Sunday World, click here
