28 April 2019
Tembisa, South Africa

Five games to play in the season, four of those being league fixtures. We are sitting a-top the heap with our destiny in our hands. Win all our remaining fixtures and we will be champions. Can we do it?

Blow by Blow

200th Game as Manager

200 games in management. At this rate I will retire at age 65 with around 1600 games!!! Pays to think ahead!

Nedbank Cup Quarter Final

These guys have been tough in the past so this will be a good battle. They have been W-L-W-L-W in last five games. Lets keep the pattern going!

This is close to my strongest line-up.

We are favourites here and really want to come away from this with a win. It will not be an easy game.

And it wasn’t twice we went behind and twice we came back. We made all of the play but just couldn’t find a way though. Once it got to penalties we didn’t have the composure required and went out of the competition.

We had the better of the game, but couldn’t find a way to win it.

ABSA Premiership – Match 24/30

Following hard on the heals of the disappointment of the cup we have a double header against Maritzburg United.

Due to fixture congestion we tweak most of the lineup in a neffort to keep the side fresh. We have a period of 4 weeks of a game every 3-4 days.

We are slight favourites in this match, however we will be taking nothing for granted.

We slaughtered them with a dominant performance. It took a while to find the net, however once we did it was fairly easy for us. Lavet chipped in with another hat-trick.

In the end we controlled the game and made a mess out of their defense. The fact that we almost blanked them in the shots department was very pleasing.

ABSA Premiership – Match 25/30

It is hard to play against the same team in the league with a 4 day turn around.

We put out a slightly stronger eleven. Lavet is retained leading the line.

Once again the pundits have us as solid favourites for the win. I don’t think it will be as comprehensive as last time out.

I was wrong. We totally owned them, and it was only our poor shooting and some great defensive work that stopped the scoreline blowing out more.

For a side that was shutout, their average ratings were pretty good. On the whole they defended well and made it hard for us to break them down.

Job Interview

Now this was an interesting job offer. I really wanted to accept it, however they were not prepared to wait until the end of the season.

ABSA Premiership – Match 26/30

Like SuperSport United, the Orlando Pirates have a history of raining on our parades. We really need to win this game so will be fielding a strong lineup.

Nogi suspended was out serving a suspension for too many yellow cards, so Lubasa and Asante were my center-back pairing.

The pundits thought that we were comfortable favorites and I tended to believe them. I wasn’t expecting an easy game but knew if we played well it should result in a win.

In the end we made hard work of this game, falling behind at the start. We struggled to find a way through, until Majola scored a well taken chance. I was resigned to dropping some points when Duarte sealed the deal with a great turn and finish.

We put up a solid display and were good value for the win, even if it took a long time to materialize.

CAF Champions League 2nd Round Leg 1

Ivorian side Séwé Sport de San-Pédro is our final obstacle to overcome before the group stage of the CAF Champions league.

We fielded a strong side for this match to make sure we came away from this fixture with some away goals.

They were not expected to unduly trouble us. That being said we were not taking chances.

Mission accomplished! As it played out we controlled the game and perhaps should have had more than the two goals advantage.

Grigorjevs had a good game, picking up POM despot not getting on the score sheet.

Match Summary

So five games played for four wins and a draw (loss on penalties). We are grinding out a title win (hopefully!).

League Table

Two points clear plus a game in hand. Can we see it out?

Next Episode

Four league games to go, plus a return visit from Sewe. It could come down to the final match of the season! Find out next time how this plays out!