It’s a massive CAF Champions League weekend for Mamelodi Sundowns. The Brazilians square off against Angola’s Atlético Petróleos de Luanda in their quarterfinal second leg fixture on Saturday, the 23rd of April, 2022.
Sundowns who narrowly lost the first leg in Angola by a 2-1 scoreline (their first loss in the competition this season) will be gunning for success at the iconic FNB Stadium as Bafana Ba Style eyes a semi-final place in the continent’s premier club competition.
In the build-up to the gigantic clash, Coach Manqoba Mngqithi spoke about the objectives of the team this weekend, “the first half of this fixture was completed in Luanda. Now our attention has shifted to the second half of the clash which will be at FNB Stadium. That is exactly where our focus is at the moment,” Coach Manqoba stated.
As part of the countdown to the mammoth game this weekend, Masandawana has gone one step further to ensure that fans come out en masse to Nasrec to support the Chloorkop -based side. A Supporters Appreciation Day will be held with live music performances from the likes of Cassper Nyovest, Makhadzi, Kabza De Small, Young Stunna, King Monada, and Hlogi Mash.
Throughout the week, The Brazilians have been involved in several activations around the Gauteng Province, which started in Tembisa, before moving to Maponya Mall in Soweto and Pretoria. The highlight of the week was in Chloorkop on Thursday where the “Yellow Nation” had the opportunity to flock in their numbers to the training ground where the first team trained ahead of the massive showdown on Saturday.
“This is a great initiative from the club, to allow us as supporters to come here and witness our boys preparing hard at training. We usually watch them on television and see them play at the stadium, but to watch them train live is an experience I will never forget. We will be at the stadium on Saturday, singing and backing our boys. We want to win this competition and the time is now, a Sundowns supporter confidently expressed.
The supporters who came through to the Open Day also had an opportunity to get vaccinated and receive their tickets in support of the vaccine drive.
One supporter who came from Mamelodi expressed his feelings about being able to watch his favourite club at training and alluded that “Mamelodi Sundowns is a big club that looks after its supporters. Being here is a day I will cherish for the rest of my life. As you know, we have been battling the pandemic and now being here is a great moment. Seeing the likes of Andile Jali, Surprise Ralani and the rest of the team is something big and we know that this is not the end because we are confident that the team will continuously thrill its supporters regularly. We are confident of getting the job done this weekend so we can reach the semi-finals of the CAF Champions League.”
It’s all systems go for the clash at FNB Stadium and the gates will be open at 15h00.
Masandawana, let’s win today’s game, dark or blue. The president once said, Sundowns should conquer Africa. It was his, and our wishes as Mighty Downs supporters re like that. The time to conquer Africa is now. Let’s win this game against the Angolans. We ‘re not afraid of anyone in front of us, including the Egyptians big dog, AL Ahly.
That was never a penalty.
Hard luck boys, Football Gods were not on our side.
Missing open play chances and penalty was a sign that we were never going to win the game.
Not sure whether this is a reflection of our mental strength at this level.
I think taking Zwane out was a mistake though.
But it’s fine, I can’t blame anyone, it was not to be I must say.
Very hard to accept the defeat. Hardy Masandawana
There was just no commitment from our players at all just like in the 1st leg. We’re still very much far from winning the 2nd star, even if we can get Jurgen Klopp or Pep Guardiola, there’s no way we csn win it with the same players. What I saw from our boyz today was the same thing I saw from Man United. The players are just not prepared to die foe the team. We need to get rid of all players above 30, abo Andile Jali, Themba Zwane, Dennis Onyango. They’re no longer adding any valuecto the team
Ya its painful that We lost but I fully agree with other Dawanas that was not a penalty got by Pedro and another thing we r not used to var hope next time everything will fall into place,let’s not despair next season will come back stronger.
But what about our penalty and their disallowed goal? I also feel our penalty was too soft. There was no need for Jali to slide tackle ther, that was very much foolish of him. He’s forever playing too deep as if he’s a defender, I don’t know if that’s the instructions from the bench
Ya Dalom kubuhlungu Mfowethu but in life We need to appreciate little things we have,next week we are competing for the third trophy in a season whereas they’re teams which just find its difficult just to be in top eight I know you’ll say we got players but few years back sasinawo ama player amahle but it was tough.
Our Wisemen are doing good job even Bayern and PSG,Man.City finds its difficult to excel on Champs league,kuzolunga because our slogan is still “The Sky is the limit”
Just imagine you’ve got a team but no trophies to show at the end of the season and those players are getting paid and travel, sleeping on expensive hotels but no trophies at the end of the season.
Its not magic or child play to achieve all we he had achieved its need proper planinig,dedication etc,let’s continue to cheer our boys even on hard times,Kby forever
If Jali is playing as a deep lying midfielder like that,does that play add any value into our play.I believe we lost the game from the bench starting from the first game where i believe positional changes like including Lebusa in the first game costed us.Our midfield in both games were not up to scratch.There were too much chopping and changing in the past few games that affected the starting lineup in the CAF champions league.We had a very consistent team in the group stages but boom we rotated the team where it mattered most.we lost this games because complecent
I agree with Rendi! We lost these 2 matches from the technical side of things! Petro was not attacking yesterday! They waited for us to come at the them! Jali’s skill was wasted at that position in which he was deployed! He played as a defender than a midfielder!!! I do not know what the thinking behind this, yet we did not have a midfielder who could distribute balls from the midfield! Our coaches have been found wanted in these games against Petro! Sirino should have started ahead of Ralani who gave us nothing going forward! We needed Mokoena or Mvala instead of Moboe! These 2 can shoot from outside the box! Our coaches are very average when it comes to such big and demanding matches! It may be very difficult to win the caf champions league with them! They still have to learn a lot from knock out games! Here there is noroom for mistakes
Coaches were being blamed last week for starting with Mokoena, now they’re being blamed again for not starting with him. I don’t know how many times they’ve been castigated for playing Mvala. We’ve become like Zebra fans, who want to coach from the stands. The only player who was fighting for the team yesterday was Maema, the rest were just not interested. Our league is just over-rated and our dominance locally with these average players clearly proves it. I watched Al Ahly on Friday night against Raja, you could see the determination and the will to win the game from both sets of players. They can score a goal from half a chance. We were even given a fake penalty which Zwane missed, but everyone would rather apportion the blame on coaches instead of calling our “Cow” players
Seconded Dalom those players didn’t show hunger to play for sundowns bedge, there was no commitment even poor handling from onyango and every time they gives zwane penalty event hough he is not converting them? even against maritzburg he miss the penalty after that maritzburg got penalty and score we endup loosing the game like yesterday. yellow I remain no matter disappointed iam
Zwane wasn’t given a penalty but he chose to take it from Lakay,and I think we need to have a permanent penalty taker at Downs from now on like in other big teams even Jali or Maema are good on taking penalties its just that Zwane thinks he’s a star at Downs more than every players we have.
Both this games of quarterfinals make me angry and I don’t know whom to blame var or some of our players but because I recorded them hope I’ll find the problem of what really happened to not progressed and I’m still saying that team is not or was not a problem to us even though they almost play our similar style of play.Kby forever
I agree with you Muzi, Jali and Maema are good penalty takers because they let the goalkeeper commit first before they kick the ball, something which Zwane is unable to do, however to say Zwane thinks he is a star at Downs, i think you are too harsh on him, because this will discourage players from volunteering to take penalties of which Zwane must be commended for his guts. I also agree on permanent penalty takers and Coaches must direct things in this regard.The midfield in my view yersterday played well, we win almost every ball however the problem is that upfront players made wrong decisions and it was not our day, luck was not on our side and we could play the whole night, that game was not meant for us to win. The combination of Jali, Moboe, Maema,Ralani, Zwane and Shalulile was still good for me.We will win some and loose some, and the is still next time ,this players can still win the champions league considering we beat Aly and dominated our group, but we had to make mistakes like we did in the first leg so that we could not advance, so that is the work of football gods not us. so let us not punish ourselves that much, next time it will be ours.