Super Downs entrench domestic dominance
● Mamelodi Sundowns remained kings of SA football with a record fourth successive league title with three matches to spare this week.
When this season started there were doubts about those who succeeded the larger-than-life Pitso Mosimane as Sundowns coach. Mosimane had won 11 trophies, including four league titles (three in a row) and the 2016 Caf Champions League in his seven years and nine months at Chloorkop.
Mosimane had been christened the “Only One” by Sundowns supporters.
Mosimane’s sudden departure to Egyptian giants Al Ahly in October caused panic in the Sundowns boardroom and fans wondered if they had not only lost the man they called Jingles in his playing days, but the grip that the Tshwane giants have on SA football.
Such were the size of Mosimane’s shoes that former club boss Patrice Motsepe felt he needed to fill Mosimane’s position with both his former assistants Manqoba Mngqithi and Rulani Mokwena as co-head coaches, with Mngqithi given leverage to have a final say in unresolved decisions.
When former Kaizer Chiefs and Lamontville Golden Arrows coach Steve Komphela was introduced as a “senior coach” on the Sundowns bench, there was fear that the star-studded team was set for failure as players could be confused about whose word they had to take onto the field.
Mngqithi, seen as the reserved one by those who know little of him, tried to allay those fears in the first interviews after Komphela was added to the team.
But when Sundowns lost their first match of the season — an MTN 8 first-round clash with Bloemfontein Celtic (1-0) — Mngqithi’s comments about the ability of the new-look technical team sounded hollow.
But there was an immediate response for the doubting Thomases when Sundowns thumped Kaizer Chiefs 3-0 at home in their opening match of the season, with two of the new strikers, Peter Shalulile and Kermit Erasmus, who had been signed by Mosimane before he left, getting Sundowns’ first two goals before Themba Zwane, who had finished the previous season as SA Footballer and Players’ Player of the Season, putting the final nail in Chiefs’ coffin.
Looking back now with Sundowns having snatched their 11th league title (in 25 years of the Premier Soccer League era) with a 3-1 victory over neighbours SuperSport United on Wednesday, it’s clear Mngqithi knew a lot more about how they were going to go about filling Mosimane’s shoes.
Mngqithi will agree, though, that while Sundowns seem to have no peer in the local league where they failed to defend the Nedbank Cup, they need a strategy to overcome the North African teams in the Champions League.
Mosimane came back to haunt his former club last week, dumping Sundowns out of the Champions League at the quarterfinal stage, which happened for the second time in a row with the same Al Ahly.
But the experience that Sundowns have earned in the Champions League, where they have reached the group stages five times in a row, is the one that gives Mngqithi’s team huge strength when it comes to the DStv Premiership.
There was simply no doubt of Sundowns retaining the league title when Orlando Pirates, who had been picked by many as their closest rivals with the signings they made before the start of the 2020-21 campaign, wobbled non-stop.
SuperSport initially showed some promise, but in the end it was unexpected title challengers AmaZulu FC, Arrows and Swallows FC who did far better than last season’s runners-up, Chiefs, who had to sack their head coach Gavin Hunt this week after an awful campaign that sees Amakhosi fighting relegation.
The integration of the new players like Shalulile, Erasmus, Gift Motupa, Lesedi Kapinga, Brian Onyango, Mthobi Mvala, George Maluleka, Aubrey Modiba and Hashim Domingo that Mngqithi and company had to oversee, was quite impressive.
It was Shalulile, though, with his 11 goals in 22 league matches (before yesterday) who stood out. The Namibian goal poacher’s nomination for Footballer of the Season and Players’ Player of the Season alongside Zwane and Maritzburg United striker Thabiso Kutumela, didn’t come as a surprise, but he should be the favourite for both gongs. Shalulile was by far the most influential player with all his goals scored in matches that the Brazilians won while also chipping in with six vital assists.
Sundowns, who’ve lost once this season, won only Wednesday’s match against SuperSport when Shalulile was not present.
The other three matches against Arrows (0-0), Black Leopards (1-1) and Swallows (1-1) were drawn while the one against Chiefs ended in a shock 2-1 defeat.
You can’t have more influence than Shalulile had and not win anything.
But for Mngqithi and his colleagues on the Sundowns bench, devising a Champions League winning formula will be uppermost in their minds as they celebrate being champions of SA.