Cracks still showing

CHIEFS CRASH OUT OF MTN8 TO CAPE TOWN NEW BOYS

It is hard to know whether Kaizer Chiefs can turn their fortunes around this season under Steve Komphela. On the one hand, the 2016/17 campaign is only two games old, far too early to start throwing wild predictions about. Defeat to PSL newcomers Cape Town City in the MTN8 quarterfinal on Friday night was embarrassing for a side with Chiefs’ cup prestige, but the Mother City is a notoriously difficult place to visit for Gauteng teams.

And Chiefs’ loss at Bidvest Wits in their Absa Premiership opener was hardly a surprise, given Wits finished as runners-up last season, and are among the favourites again.

Then again, Chiefs are in a rancid run of form that dates back way beyond the borders of this season – Komphela’s side have won just one of their last 15 matches in all competitions.

The Chiefs coach seems to have little clue how to fix the malaise, with his side continuing to play a ponderous brand of football, all slow build-up and little end-product, with more cracks in the defence showing up this season too.

“We tried, we were battling it out, we tried our best to get a win and couldn’t,” Komphela told SuperSport after Friday’s 1-0 loss to City.

“All we needed was to equalise then things would change ... we knocked (on the door) enough unfortunately it (the goal) didn’t come. The biggest mistake we committed was at our corner, then on the break they go and score – we could have dealt better with that.”

City took the lead as early as the 7th minute, when Australian midfielder Matthew Sim (pictured) headed away a Chiefs corner, and bombed all the way up the end of the pitch to get on the end of a smart counter-attack and clip the ball past Itumeleng Khune.

“I am very proud of the boys,” City coach Eric Tinkler told SuperSport afterwards, who has won two out of two at the Cape side so far.

“It was important to be disciplined defensively … we knew they would be looking to come at us and I thought we defended exceptionally well.”