City lacking ambition, says McCarthy
BENNI McCarthy slammed his players for their lack of consistency and ambition after Cape Town City were humbled 1-0 by AmaZulu at King Zwelithini Stadium in uMlazi, Durban, on Saturday in an Absa Premiership tussle.
Tapelo Nyongo scored a beauty of a free kick as Usuthu collected back-to-back maximum points, having defeated Mamelodi Sundowns in their previous encounter.
The Citizens had an opportunity to go third and on level with Orlando Pirates on 33 points on the log, but fluffed that prestigious chance.
They would have been four points off the log leaders, Bidvest Wits, and still with the game in hand.
Speaking with the media after the game, McCarthy, questioned the ambition of his players.
“If you look at it closely, it is a missed opportunity because had the results been different, I think we would have been in a different situation (on the log).
“Maybe certain occasions are too big for my players. We need to completely be under the radar or in the skies. Maybe this score checking, finding out what happened elsewhere, is really a bad thing because it just disturbs the momentum. Now players think you win and you go third. It is too much (for them). It is something that they won’t prepare for or they can’t deal with it psychologically because it seems to be a theme,” a worried McCarthy explained.
The results favoured the Citizens on Saturday. Orlando Pirates shared the spoils with Kaizer Chiefs in a 1-1 stalemate, while Bidvest Wits succumbed to a 2-1 defeat at Makhulong Stadium in Tembisa, Johannesburg.
“Every time we get in to a situation where we can make a nice step, we don’t take it. It is like we want to be a modest team. We don’t have that ambition to take the next step. It was a missed opportunity for us,” he added.
The former Bafana Bafana marksman is not too worried, though, about what is happening at the summit of the table.
“We are running our own race. We are not bothered by what happens at the top or at the bottom. For us we come to work Monday to Friday, work hard and try to improve. We want to see what we worked on during the week in the matches. That’s how we work. We are not bothered about the league table,” McCarthy elaborated.
Asked if his team could finish in the top 3, McCarthy replied: “If you look at Chiefs, they have how many players? 40? Pirates got, do I have to say it? We’ve got 23 players if I’m not mistaken, plus some of the MultiChoice Diski Challenge boys that I throw in. We don’t have a massive squad. I don’t have the luxury of rotating. I’ve tried to maintain the consistency with the side. It is more of the less, the same team and the same core.
“I don’t have Pirates, Chiefs and Sundowns’ squad of quality players which I can unleash.”