Sekhukhune United registered their first-ever win against Orlando Pirates at the Orlando Stadium on Wednesday night when they secured a slim 1-0 win.
The win was a massive blow for the Soweto giants, who are still hopeful of beating Mamelodi Sundowns to the Premier Soccer League title. The defending champions opened a 12-point gap at the top of the table after a deserved 3-0 win over Richards Bay on Wednesday evening.
In the first half, the Buccaneers looked like the team likely to get a goal, but things did not work out in their favour.
‘Babina Noko gave Bucs too many opportunities'
“But like I said in the first half, we gave them too many opportunities, and my concern at halftime was that when you give a team of their quality many opportunities, you're going to get punished,” Sekhukhume coach Eric Tinkler conceded to the media.
“But I think we fixed it in the second half, and the opportunities were far and few between, you know, they had greater opportunities.
“There was one that went wide of the post from Evidence Makgopa, there was one that they missed, yes, from a cross into the box. But ultimately, a much better performance from us defensively in the first half, not so. I mean in the second half, not so much the first half.”
Chiefs given a blueprint on how to beat Pirates?
Kaizer Chiefs will play Orlando Pirates on Saturday in the PSL's Soweto Derby before meeting again in the Nedbank Cup final a week later. Having conceded four goals from set pieces in their last two games, Amakhosi might fancy their chances from the same situation.
“We made it more difficult for them, we managed to catch them on a few transition moments, we spoke about how important the set-pieces are against them because we found that obviously watching them in the Caf competitions was a weakness and we ended up getting a goal from a set-piece,” Tinkler stated how the tactic worked.
“I said the longer the game goes, the greater the chance we have, especially from a set-piece, to win it, and I thought the second half performance from the boys was really, really good. Just felt sometimes we got to be a little bit better on the ball and try to keep possession because having to chase for 90 minutes is not an easy task,” he concluded.
