With a bit of hard work, Stoffels sees an all-star ending

IT’S been a season to forget so far at Cape Town All Stars. Three losses, three draws and a win has left them in second-last on the NFD log. Two head coaches have already come and gone, with Mlungisi “Professor” Ngubane leaving two games into the season and his replacement Patrick Mabedi also resigning after two matches in charge.

It all makes for troubling reading but in spite of their setbacks, striker Lesvin Stoffels believes things are on the up and up for All Stars.

“I think our performances are getting better and better because we aren’t conceding so many goals anymore,” he said. “From a striker’s point of view, we just need to score more.

“Our defenders and midfielders are doing a job for us, so we just need to put the ball in the back of the net. So I think that is what we’re lacking.”

All Stars conceded 12 goals in their first four games, which included a 6-2 drubbing against Royal Eagles. But they’ve since leaked just one in their last three matches. Theirlast two results, a 1-0 win over Mthatha Bucks and a 0-0 draw with Jomo Cosmos, have come with assistant coach Dylan Deane in charge.

“In football, coaches and players come and go. We have just told ourselves, ‘guys, we can’t do anything about it’. We need to focus on our league and we want to win the league so we can’t think about it and feel sad,” Stoffels said.

“Some coaches bring new ideas and even though they’re not there anymore they’ve left us with something good that we can take forward. The players have learned from the coaches who left, because you can see we’re applying it now under the current coach.”

Stoffels hopes All Stars’ form continues when they host Black Leopards at Athlone Stadium today (3.30pm). They finished in seventh position last season and have some catching up to do if they are to match that this term. “We could finish in the top three because that is our aim. Everything is possible with hard work,” he said.