Why Sebelebele & not Matuludi? Mosimane justifies decision to start Pirates star

Orlando Pirates versatile defender Kamogelo Sebelebele put up a Man-of-the-Match performance in Bafana Bafana’s 2-1 win over Guinea at the Orlando Stadium.

The two nations had met in Group D of the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) qualifier where Pitso Mosimane needed maximum points at home to enjoy fans’ support.

Ime Okon scored the first goal, before the National Elephants struck back through Seydouba Cisse but Samukele Kabini ensured South Africa claimed maximum points to go top of the pool.

One of the decisions made by ‘Jingles’ was to start Sebelebele ahead of Thabang Matuludi. This was even after the latter’s solid start at Mamelodi Sundowns following his move from Polokwane City.

Unbelievable! Sebelebele played well

“This [Guinea] is a quality team. I mean, their wingers are full of trickery. (Lamine Diaby)-Fadiga, he came on and created a problem also on the left side, but Sebelebele was there to match the duels, and that number ten who was giving problems in the first half; they had so much good quality wingers,” Mosimane conceded.

“The players from Guinea are big boys, tall and strong. I was worried a bit about Sebelebele on set-pieces, but it was like for like, the people he was marking were not very tall, and he’s got the speed to recover the ball and he’s good on one-v-ones. Okay, in the first half he had a little bit of a challenge because the guy has a lot of trickery.

“But he found him out and he managed to settle. He was Man of the Match, right? Unbelievable, he played well. I guess it’s about the confidence in the areas. I mean, he’s playing every day in those spaces.

“Normally at Pirates you know he is, right? He is always at the end of the attack but not [on Saturday]. This is not the game for him to be doing that. I needed Sebelebele not to overlap too much. I needed him to do what he had to do. Mutuludi is good but there’s a lot of tricks here, one-v-ones, so Sebelebele was the right person for the game,” Mosimane concluded.