WHAT’S ON CHIEFS

KAIZER CHIEFS brought some light to their nickname “the Glamour Boys” during yesterday’s training session in their build-up to the 64th Soweto derby, which is scheduled for Saturday.

On and off the pitch, they looked the part as they treated their guests – designated media houses around Gauteng – to an exclusive tour around the village with their legends, while during and after the training session the players were easy on the eye – portraying an image of a team that looks eager to end the hoodoo that their arch-rivals Orlando Pirates have had over them in their last three meetings. The entertainment started with the entrance of Ace Khuse, a club legend – who played for both Chiefs and Pirates, to the training pitch as he embraced in-form Hendrick Ekstein just before the start of the training session.

“It makes me happy to see him play regularly,” Khuse said. “It gives me hope that we’ve got a creative midfield that will make things happen. Once you have that player, it becomes easier for our strikers to get opportunities to score.”

Three is starting to become a theme at Chiefs. They’ve lost three times to Pirates, and are also enduring a threeyear trophy drought. Add to the fact that Khuse was part of a legendary trio that also included Arthur Zwane and Kaizer Motaung Junior.

Just like their “theme”, they were placed in three stations for the interviews.

Despite the station segregation, they all conformed that Amakhosi would be victorious at FNB Stadium on Saturday. Their hopes though will be mostly dependent on improvement in Chiefs’ goalkeeping department as they’ve cost the team a great deal of late.

However, it appeared that Chiefs are already in motion to rectify that as they were already under way with their training session, while the rest of the infield players were still putting their kit on. Although there were five keepers at training, three from first team and two from the reserves – it will come down to either Virgil Vries or Daniel Akpeyi for that No 1 jersey on Saturday. Akpeyi is new to the fold after being recently signed from Chippa United, while Vries has been guilty of making mistakes this season.

Veteran striker Bernard Parker has backed either of the two shotstoppers to do the job for the club on Saturday.

“The good thing about football is that there will always be the next game that’s going to come up for you to rectify things,” Parker said about the beleaguered Vries. “You get time to patch up and hit the ground running. He’s well aware of what’s happening (that someone has come in to possibly take the No 1 spot away from him). But I think he’ll never repeat this. But everybody has welcomed Daniel, and we think he’ll be a great addition to the team.” |