Pitso recognises threat City pose
MOSIMANE: THEY HAVE GOT A VERY GOOD ATTACK
Sundowns lost at home to Tinkler’s men earlier this season.
Mamelodi Sundowns coach Pitso Mosimane has acknowledged the threat posed by Cape Town City’s lethal attacking duo Lebogang Manyama and Aubrey Ngoma, as the Brazilians look to grab three precious points in the title race at the Athlone Stadium tonight.
The defending champions need a victory to leapfrog City on the Absa Premiership, and will go top with a win if Bidvest Wits fail to pick up three points at home to Bloemfontein Celtic. Both games kick off at 8pm.
City – the season’s surprise package so far – will be guaranteed to top the table for at least 24 hours if they can beat Sundowns, with current leaders SuperSport United at home to Ajax Cape Town tomorrow evening.
“They are a difficult team, they are on form,” said Mosimane of Eric Tinkler’s side.
“They have got a very good attack ... it is only those two people – Manyama and Ngoma – who are causing problems. We really have to look after them. But how far can we look after them? So we also have to test their defence. We need to test if their defence is also good enough to stop our attack. You know how football is – we can’t worry too much about them because they also have to worry about us.”
City beat Masandawana 2-1 away in their first-round encounter on October 30, with captain Manyama scoring twice. But Mosimane explains that his team were still enjoying a honeymoon, with the City match coming just a week after the Caf Champions League triumph over Zamalek.
“It was a funny game because we were coming from Egypt after winning the Champions League – these are games that are a little bit awkward. The game we played against Chippa United in the mud (a 1-1 draw), we had TP Mazembe (in the Super Cup) in four days’ time,” said Mosimane, whose side also drew 0-0 with Chippa in a game played over two days on Tuesday and Wednesday, because of floodlight failure at Loftus Versfeld.
Mosimane added that he hopes to have rightback Anele Ngcongca and striker Anthony Laffor available again for the City game. Sundowns will however have to do without key midfielder Hlompho Kekana for this game, as he is serving a suspension.
In tonight’s third match Chippa travel to Phokeng to take on Platinum Stars.