Mamelodi Sundowns and Cape Town City played out a tame goalless draw at Loftus Versfeld Stadium on Tuesday night as the Tshwane giants stretched their unbeaten run in the DStv Premiership. Masandawana were honored by The Citizens as they walked out of the tunnel through a “Guard of Honor” from the opponents, over the weekend the reigning Champions retained their league title while participating in their final CAF Champions League Group B encounter.
Bafana Ba Style have collected 60 points so far in the domestic league competition, dropping 2 points against The Mother City side who are currently in fifth place on the standings. Downs Head Coach Rulani Mokwena expressed his satisfaction with the team’s fighting spirit in the encounter as they aimed to collect maximum points, he said:
“[It was] A tough game, very difficult game against a good opponent with very good players on the pitch, but a good game of football. I like the performance a lot better than the performances of Coton Sport and Al Hilal also. Today I liked the performances, just the differences – in Sudan [was that] we scored, the last match we scored two and today we just couldn’t score, but I liked the performance today. It’s football you know you can’t win them all, we go again and prepare for Swallows and try to win the next one.”
The Brazilians had the better of the chances, with Marcelo Allenede, Cassius Mailula and Peter Shalulile coming close to goal. Coach Rulani addressed the missed opportunities that they couldn’t capitalize on to win the game.
“Today I think we had a little bit of anxiety in the final third and I don’t know what happened, but that’s why I can write it off very, very quickly because it’s unlike us. On another day Cassius [Mailula] makes a better first touch and opens the body and takes a shot. Today he closes the body and looks for a combination, on another day [Themba Zwane] Mshishi opens the body and takes a shot instead of looking [for his teammates]. Neo [Maema] makes a better decision to not go to his right but come to his left in one of the situations, Peter [Shalulile] has a better touch on the diagonal.”
“It’s football, this is what makes the game so interesting, you never know what to expect. What we can control is the performances, the schemes and with us it’s very clear, our build-up schemes are very clear and today much safer and much more controlled [with] less errors. [Aubrey] Modiba was so good today also and he’s so important for us with the build-up. [Teboho Mokoena] Tebza was good, sometimes you can find the diagonal pass a little bit more instead of finding the vertical pass from one half space to another but we can find for an example Neo to Allende or [Grant Kekana] Zeda to Allende, but but listen today I was happy with the performance, happy with the intensity, happy with the passing and the movement.”
“Maybe it’s also my fault you know, because when I analyzed the games I said you could have passed instead of taking a shot. How many times do you see us come to the final third and sometimes instead of making a pass we shoot? So maybe it’s my fault also, because I encouraged a little bit more of the extra pass. I was happy with the performance actually. On another day to be honest, on another day we make better decisions, so [it’s] very easy for me to write this off.”
Mamelodi Sundowns prepare to get in action with Swallows on Sunday at the Dobsonville Stadium, kick off is at 3pm.
Very good football, Mailula missed lot of chances and end up being too selfish… Where is Sirino?
Sirino is on the injury list bro
Despite running away with the league and doing well in champions league, the team finds itself in a difficult position… How do you approach the league games? 7 of them… Do you continue using the same team? Risking fatigue, injury etc… Do you rest them? Risking loss of form, cohesiveness etc… Its very difficult. The players can’t be cold coming into the champions league knock out. Its a delicate situation to navigate.