Coach breathes big sigh of relief

TINKLER: WE KNEW IT WAS GOING TO BE REALLY HARD

Maritzburg slight favourites going into second leg at home.

Before the MTN8 firstleg semifinal away to SuperSport United, Maritzburg United had won three games on the trot and had not let in a single goal since the start of the season.

So Eric Tinkler was well aware of the challenge his team was confronted with when they took on Fadlu Davids’ charges on Saturday night.

The Team of Choice held Matsatsantsa to a 1-1 draw at the Lucas Moripe Stadium, giving them a slight edge ahead of the second leg at Harry Gwala Stadium on September 9.

“We knew it was always going to be extremely hard against them, they’ve started the season very well and they are highly motivated and confident,” said Tinkler.

“They are a team that work extremely hard and are not an easy team to break down in terms of their defensive structure. Overall I can’t be entirely disappointed by the performance. I saw a lot of positives from this. We have to go to Harry Gwala and look for an away goal and if we do that we are back in the tie,” he added.

Davids was pleased with his side’s gallant showing that saw them snatch a late equaliser, but has cautioned his relatively inexperienced youthful troops to curb their excitement ahead of the return leg.

“The players showed fantastic determination to come back, they probed until they got the goal. At times I had to hold them back because they wanted to go and get more, and SuperSport are a counterattacking team, if you go in with six or seven players, you can get caught, as happened with the first goal.

“The youngsters tend to get carried away and excited and they do things they are not supposed to. We will take it (the second leg) as a normal game and take it as a 0-0 game. We have to win it,” said the 36-year-old.

He added: “What we have to now is reset, analyse and improve from this performance, it was definitely not the best, we can do better and I am sure we will do well at Harry Gwala.”

The youngsters tend to get carried away and excited and they do things they are not supposed to.

Fadlu Davids Maritzburg United coach