Mamelodi Sundowns made it 13 wins on the bounce at Mbombela Stadium with a deserved 2-1 victory over TS Galaxy on Tuesday evening. Rushine De Reuck and Peter Shalulile were on target as Masandawana extended their winning streak in the DStv Premiership to strengthen their chances of retaining the Premier Soccer League title at Chloorkop.
Bafana Ba Style were faced with a resilient Galaxy side from the first half throughout the encounter at Mbombela, however efforts from the collective secured them an early goal in the heated clash. Downs Head Coach Rulani Mokwena gave credit to everyone involved at the club in making sure that the team delivers their best performances with every game that they play, he said:
“It’s a team effort and it must be recognized as a team effort, of course the plaudits and the shine has to go to the players. The game of football belongs to the players so congratulations to the players, the technical team and the Mamelodi Sundowns supporters they deserve it all.”
“We are a good team with very good players and we also happen to have very good human beings in the change room. It becomes a little bit easier when you have good human beings and good football players who happen to be good human beings. We have to continue now to try and be better, we’ve got a difficult one on Saturday but today was a very good performance and the team on the pitch created so many chances [and] should have scored more goals but congratulations to the players we are very proud of them.”
Coach Rulani also provided an update on De Reuck’s concussion that he sustained after scoring his goal in the first half: “Rushine is on his feet, it’s very good that he has regained consciousness. The medical team needs to be given lots of praise from both Mamelodi Sundowns and TS Galaxy for the prompt response, and it’s good to see that he’s walking and he’s gained consciousness.”
“He scored a very, very important goal for us which opened up the game a bit and we are just grateful that he’s in a condition to be able to recognize his surroundings now. [We are] very, very proud of his contribution towards the win.”
Masandawana now have a record-extending 13th successive victory in the domestic league competition and have so far won all their opening six games in the 2023 football calendar. Coach Rulani gave a word on the heavy fixture that they have participated in and what lays ahead of the team: “We know about the schedule, we knew about it before we even went into the mini mid-season break and we worked a little bit hard in trying to train every player to make sure that every player is ready.”
“This is the situation we find ourselves in, in a big club you’ve always got to be ready to play every two to three days and the depth allows us to give opportunities confidently and trust in each and every player that’s in the team, that’s what we have to do. The only solution to a hectic schedule is freshness, rotation and to make everybody feel part of the process.”
“We continue to work, [it was] the seventh game today when others have only played three or maybe four games [and] we’ve played seven games in twenty four days. It’s not easy because that means there’s no training or enough time, but we are working a little bit harder to make sure that we continue to improve the team and to improve the individual players that are within the team.”
The Brazlians get ready to face Sekhukhune United on Saturday in Pretoria, a team they have faced three times in the DStv Premiership competition with two wins and a draw. Babina Noko are on a winning roll, the Limpopo based team have also won all their January fixtures and will be hopeful as they travel to the Capital to lock horns with the DStv giants. Coach Rulani gave a slight peek into what their opponents will bring to the battlefield.
“[They are a] tough team that plays with inverted full backs, [they] play very similar to how Truter’s Swallows team plays [but] of course with different players and different individual qualities [that] makes it a little bit more different. [They have] some very good players in the team, they’ve got experienced players in the team, it’s going to be a difficult game.”
“Now it’s recovery [time] and trying to get back to Joburg. Lots of fluids and rest for the players, and then we will do our analysis of this game and pick up the things we will need to pick up to improve and then we will do oppositional analysis after that. But then step by step, one day at a time and continue to work with a lot of calmness and our feet on the ground.”
We have passionate and hard working players and technical team.We the changes made I thought our game would drop but it was even better than the Chiefs game,bravo to both technical team and players.Sipho Mbule is some special,skilful with precise passes and don’t hold on to the ball too long.Mkhulise,Jali,Mandela and Saavedra really impressed me,they played like they have been playing all along.My only concern was poor finishing and the silly penalty we conceded.My wish is to see Pieterse and Saavedra starting our next game.It is time to start preparing for future and these two players are part of it.Pieterse suit our style of play because he is more comfortable on feet.Happy to be associated with this big brand.
Good performance all round and of course just disappointed with the misses by Sirino which could have helped us to score more goals and also the penalty we conceded was too cheap which dents our clean sheets, but then again this is football one has to leave room for some errors it is good that we won in the end. I was impressed by Blesser, Jali, Mbule, Mshishi and laos Sifiso showed great improvement from the previous games he is a special talent that needs to be nurtured. Good tactics from the technical team. Was also impressed by the subs this is evdent that Sundowns train a squad and not a team. Good luck for Saturday, we have beaten our own winning streak record let’s try to create an even more difficult record to beat next time as long as we hold that record
Thank you coach keep on working harder and improving the team while losers are cry babies accusing us of killing SA football, jealous is ripping their hearts, and I like it when Zebbies are hurt, they now see that we are a real big giant and dominating everyone.Intead of trying to model what we do , they undermine the work that our technical team and players do on the field.what they do is admission of being a loser on their part.while they do all these senseless insults in the media, tell our players to focus coach because this might be a psychological ploy against our players and technical team to lose focus so that they can catch up.Continue to “more them coach” we love it as Masandawana. Kby.
I wanted to “moer” instead of more
This chorus of Sundowns is killing competition stunt from former Kaizer Chiefs players like Jabu Pule and Neil Tovey is starting to annoy me now.They are raising this FIFA FAIR PLAY theory in bad faith.The Motsepe Foundation is sponsoring both 1st&2nd divisions in our country and there’s nothing wrong in that but the baby of the Motsepe Family of which is Sundowns is not supposed to be looked after baffles me.We are involved in so many competitions of which we are taking them very serious and statistics shows that this season we have used all our players but 3 players who haven’t feature at all.The excuse of Bafana Bafana being weakened by Sundowns doesn’t hold water,Hugo Broos has been reluctant to select Jali,Zwane&Khuliso Mudau only for his arrogance and selfishness just to prove a point,how does that becomes a Sundowns problem?South Africa has failed to produce prolific strikers since the start of our democracy.I can mention players who were produce during apartheid era like Masinga brothers,Noel Cousins, Mark Williams,Maponyane,Mambush,Bartlett and Tovey&Pule just remind us what is the name of the striker has been destroyed by Sundowns?Again we had great defenders like Khambule,Sizwe Motang,Radebe, Fish,Andrew Tucker,Nyathi, Gavin Lane,Goodman Hlongwane,Moses Khamanga, Bricks Mudau the list go on and on but the blame game starts and ends with Sundowns.We can hardly qualify for Caf competition for the country even pitted against low ranked countries like Gambia,Niger,Ethiopia and Sudan yet we are pointing fingers to the direction of Sundowns ,Wowww!!!!Supersport Company is pumping billions of Rands to the Psl but not to their club,a certain club within the league is owned by richest billionaire yet he is so stingy to lose money and make his the best in the league.Kaizer Chiefs &Pirates are getting huge money from Vodacom and other sponsorship companies yet they are reluctant and stingy to buy players,even during the time of lockdown Chiefs produced more revenue from sponsors but are signing free agent players.Hayi yekani umona..