Franco doffs his hat to Sundowns
AmaZulu coach Pablo Franco has conceded that Mamelodi Sundowns are the best team on the continent and feels it will take something special for any team to try and stop them.
This after his side lost 3-0 to Sundowns in the DStv Premiership match at Loftus Versfeld Stadium on Tuesday, courtesy of a Lucas Ribeiro Costa’s second-half hat-trick.
Franco believes Sundowns have players who are capable of adjusting in any situation, and this makes it difficult for teams to try and stop them.
“Sundowns have amazing footballers and the coach [Rulani Mokwena] understands that with these players, he needs to create a structure to play the kind of football they are playing,” Franco told the media during the post-match press conference.
“And this is what they are doing with the best goalkeeper in Africa [Ronwen Williams].
“They have players with a lot of quality who are capable when building up to reach the next line and then you have even better players in terms of quality, decision-making, accuracy ... and the capacity to finish in this team is amazing.
“They are also a team that is dominating most teams in the continent with their physicality. They can counter-press and press high. For me, they are machines.”
The Spanish coach also admitted the reason Bafana Bafana had a decent Africa Cup of Nations in Ivory Coast was because of the dominance of Sundowns players who have experience in the continent.
“I’m following African football, not only South African football. I have never seen a team in Africa with that capacity to dominate games, the capacity to make good decisions, to be offensive and be accurate,” he said.
“I also think that reflects the success of your national team.
“In the end, when you see the performance of the national team playing with Sundowns players and reaching third position in the international competition where most of the teams had players playing in Europe, you can see that when they are competing, they are beating them or drawing with them.
“I think Sundowns are a super team... and I’m proud that when we played the first game against them and if we were fair with the disallowed goal, we would have been the first team to beat them.