Johannesburg – Mamelodi Sundowns co-coach Rulani Mokwena says that Chippa United will be toughest opponent to face as the two sides will battle-off in so much-anticipated showdown as the DStv Premiership returns to action tomorrow post the seasonal break.
The ever-confident Mokwena says that his side will not take advantage of the struggling Chippa United, where they were knocked out of the Nedbank Cup at the hands of University of Pretoria where the match ended with a 2-0 humiliation loss for the Chilli Boys.
“I think the influence of Gavin Hunt cannot be taken out it has impacted the club,” said Mokwena.
“Because if you look at their last matches even yesterday against Tuks, they were unfortunate and it is all clear that the club’s style of play is not changing, the influence of Hunt has hampered into the team to commit plenty of mistakes.
“However, I think I need to commend the work done by Kurt Lentjies is really fantastic, the team that was of Hunt they still kept the strength, physicality and they look more composed on the ball,” he added.
“It’s a team that seems like they are going into another level, where they don’t just kick the ball forward, they have patterns of their play, they look better organized, we will really have to work hard to get the ball from them,” he said.
“It should be an interesting game that we will be looking forward to, of course coming from two past games where we had to travel, it helped us to recover and be prepared for upcoming matches,” he added.
Mokwena said his side will be in full swing to claim more points as the current leaders have now garnered 44 points.
Meanwhile, there was another upset on Saturday night when the DStv Premiership side, Golden Arrows, was humiliated by the GladAfrica Championship’s Tshakhuma Tsha Madzivhandila, after they were booted out of the Nedbank Cup as they suffered a 7-6 in penalty shootout.
Abafana Bes’Thende’s coach Lehlohonolo Seema said his side channeled themselves with positivity, however luck was not on their side.
“Yeah, no is one of those games where we dominated the game, but only thing we failed to do was score goals, and in football, if you don’t score goals, you will there’s no way you will win the match,” said Seema.
“There’s not so much we can do except to say that we feel bad for the boys unlucky for them, we were not able to win the match after we played so well, however is a lesson for us that if we don’t score goals, you won’t win matches, once the game ends in penalties is like a lottery,” he added.
He said the team will now shift their focus to the league in bid to finish in a better position this season.
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