Mamelodi Sundowns made it two wins from their opening two league games after Neo Maema’s last-gasp winner secured all three points at the Lucas Moripe Stadium on Wednesday afternoon.
The Brazilians dominated much of the early proceedings, taking control of possession in the opposition half as Amakhosi retreated into a low block.
Masandawana newbie Thapelo Maseko was the stand out threat in the first half as he engaged in an enthralling battle with his opposing fullback Reeve Frosler on the left hand flank. The two went head-to-head in numerous duels that filled the stadium with energy. Maseko’s trademark cut back from the byline found Shalulile unmarked, however the Namibian’s attempt on goal was cleared away by the Chiefs defender.
The intensity in the press from Downs was clear to see and it paid off just after twenty minutes as midfielder Themba Zwane forced a mistake from Edson Castillo whose loose pass fell to Shalulile in the box, the Namibian unselfishly teed up Lucas Ribeiro who scored his second goal in as many games.
The remainder of the first half saw Bafana Ba Style look to extend their lead, with chances falling to Mosa Lebusa and Riberio, however the team were unable to punish. As a result the high energy first half came to an end with Sundowns ahead.
The second half began with an early chance for the home side, the Brazilians Lucas Ribiero played a delightful ball across goal to Shalulile who was unable to finish from close range as the ball got stuck under his feet.
The difficulty in front of goal would continue for the remainder of the second half for the as the team in yellow struggled to put their chances away. Striker Shalulile was twice denied by Brandon Petersen who stood tall to foil the Namibian’s attempts.
Thapelo Maseko saw two chances go abegging as his rebounded effort from a Petersen save went wide, before he also had a right-footed shot saved by the Amakhosi shot-stopper.Coach Rulani and his technical team looked to freshen up the side with the introduction of Neo Maema, Sipho Mbule and Brian Onyango midway through the second half.
With six minutes to go the visiting side pulled one goal back on a breakaway attack, with Ashley Du Preez netting past Ronwen Williams, who had a fairly quiet afternoon between the sticks.
With regulation time coming to a close, The Brazilians launched one final attack on goal and it proved to be decisive as substitute Neo Maema volleyed the ball into the back of the net to secure the winning goal in the final minute of the game and send the sold out Lucas Moripe stadium into raptures.
Bongani Zungu and Aubrey Modiba were entered into the fray in stoppage to help Downs close out the result and register their second win of the season. The Brazilians will now switch gear to prepare for the upcoming Wafa Wafa clash in the MTN8 against Steve Komphela’s Moroka Swallows side this weekend.
How We Lined Up: Williams, Mudau, Boutouil, Mvala, Lebusa, Mokoena, Allende, Zwane, Ribeiro, Maseko, Shalulile.
Subs: D. Onyango, B. Onyango, Maema, Kekana, Nku, Mbule, Zungu, Modiba, Aubaas
Good win….important win….we were fluid today as opposed to the Friday match…Allende was something else today…top performer…congrats to Maseko…superb performance. Terrorizing Frosler….I agree with Rhulani…we kept Chiefs in the game by missing chances…it’s hard to criticize Shalulile because of the amount of work he puts in…he contributed immensely to the first goal….the ball always seems to be out of reach when he has to take a short…it may be body position that let’s him down…overall very good performance by the whole team… I’m just worried how casual we are with getting yellow cards….it doesn’t look professional…we need to put a lid on it…..congrats to the football club
Thanx for the win even though we made Chiefs looked good with our poor finishing, they’re few things that worries me,namely,the overconfident of our goalkeeper with those short passes and too many back passes oneday the clever strikers will punish us severely another one is playing Boutouli on leftback whereas we got four leftbacks with high speed,he should be played on central defence and Mvala sits on grandstand he commits lot of mistakes and last we dwell or trust on Shalulile too much and failed to sign a good striker to help him and most of us we were crying about a forcefully striker in Mayele but our Management ignored our plea till he went to Pyramid We all know that Nassir is injury prone even now we were told he’s injured again and it will be hard to all this competitions we gonna compete on with one striker because Ribeiro is always on wings,lets better break the bank and sign Mayo if we are serious on winning the league,that’s my two cents opinion,Kby forever
Morning yellow Nation.Congrats to the Players and Technical Team .On the game we did very well.Firstly we control the game n Created chances. We should have atleast score 6 Clear Goals.What l have learn about this game Strikers they go under dry spell and in this modern game is no longer about Strikers scoring goals middlefieldera they have to score. Secondly we should replace Sha Sha with other Striker not middlefield we hav Gift ,Nasir and young Kelse.
Mistake l notice you can never pair Onyango and Mvala both very slow and aggressive that’s why we conceded a goal.
Otherwise the boys did very well our Samba boy once he settle is going to kill alot of teams.
Please let us fill up the stadium we have no excuse
Y is he(Onyango) still a sundowns player cos he has proven time and time again that he is not a sundowns material…..our we still gonna complain about the same players in this season too!!!( Brian Onyango,Mvala,Kutumela,Modiba)
Yellow Machine. We really need a strikers who are more hungrier. We can’t rely on Peter alone. We need to remember the caf.Peter needs to ne thirsty again. Mvala needs to be clean at the back. Too rough for no reasons. Chiefs goal tease him. Please try Kekana and De Ruck.
De Reuk would definitely be a good option but he’s currently a long term injury…probably half the season
Members I concur with your comments,first is the discipline issue,how does Mudau gets a yellow card for fouling a strike in his half facing his goals? We really made Chiefs look good in terms of score line when they were not in the game,we should have hammered them.Peter is a hard worker and we appreciate his work but he is not a good finisher,Mailula would have scored 3 goals yesterday.We really need to break a bank to get Mayo b4 transfer window closes or bring Carelse,the boy has speed,works hard and can score goals or play Mutupa he can also score goals.Shalulie is our first line of defense and when things not going his way he must learn to provide assists like he did on our first goal,I think he should have passed Mudau for a nice tap in with the last chance he got.We must also rearrange our defense Kekana must be in the starting line up.We found sensations in Maseko and Costa.Allende was excellent,him and Mokoena nullified the entire Chiefs midfield.I can’t wait for the introduction of Nku and Aubaas for they both attack aggressively.If we can’t win 3 trophies this and have 75 league points it will be a criminal offence.We displayed good quality football and we nearly messed it up by missing sure goals scoring chances.Let’s work on it b4 mtn8.Amen.
I think the team played well generally except the missed chances of course!! As for me I think the squad is okay and we don’t need any cover for any position for that matter!! The Centre position is being played by Shasha all the time because of his work ethics that compasate for his erratic shooting at times but we do have players that can play in that position for sure. A fit Gift and Nassir can play in that position given a chance. Even in defence we enough personnel to see out our congested season. If the coach can select the right players in their usually and naturally positions I do not see any defeciency in the squad!!
I agree with you members, we need a striker now before the window close, we love Sha Sha but now he seems to be missing clear chances