CT City’s Nodada will be looking for those extra pockets
FOOTBALL is always obsessed with the pretty and the brilliant. It’s just the nature of the sport we call “the beautiful game”. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a space under the spotlight for the grafters, the workhorses and the unselfish team men. For example: Hlompho Kekana, the man who makes Mamelodi Sundowns tick, has finished second in the PSL Player of the Year award for two consecutive seasons.
Cape Town City, too, have such a lung-busting presence in central midfield in Thabo Nodada. The Durban-born 23-year-old has rocketed to prominence over the last 12 months, revelling in the confidence of his coach, Benni McCarthy. Now, as City prepare to take on Sundowns in an MTN8 semi-final first leg tie at the Cape Town Stadium on Saturday (3pm), Nodada will again be a key figure if the Cape side is to emerge victorious.
Nodada has had a stunning start to the campaign. City have played just four games but the unflappable midfielder has already picked up two man of the match awards: against Maritzburg United and Golden Arrows.
Although he hails from Durban, it was at Mpumalanga Black Aces where he first started showing promise. He was in the Aces squad relocated to the Mother City. At the time he was struggling with injury and saw little game-time during the club’s debut season. Once McCarthy took over, there was only one way for Nodada: up.
The former Bafana Bafana striker loves players who leave everything on the pitch and, in Nodada, he had such a player. Every week, when the stats for the PSL are released, Nodada delivers astonishing numbers for kilometres covered during a match. For example, in last year’s MTN8 final (which City lost against SuperSport United), Nodada covered an astounding 15.6 kilometres during the game.
McCarthy has added another string to the player’s bow, in encouraging him to make intelligent late runs from midfield to get in behind stubborn defences; no doubt, this is another ploy McCarthy wants to utilise against Sundowns on Saturday.
Nodada is aware that it will be tough against a top outfit like Sundowns, but he is looking forward to the challenge.
“After the league draw at the weekend, our focus can now shift to preparing for Sundowns,” said Nodada. “If there’s anything we have learnt from the first MTN8 game (against Maritzburg), it’s that teams generally play at a different intensity, more so when they face us. We know that it’s not easy facing a team like Sundowns, they have quality all over the park, but the good thing is that they won’t sit back and wait for us. It’s always an open game, which gives us that extra bit of space to find pockets to operate in. We’ll put our all into this match and then look to complete the job away in the second leg.”