A sure sign of how well a team is doing is when teammates praise each other’s efforts ahead of their own, highlighted by Thuso Mlamla’s assessment of TUT’s season to date.
The Red Machine are currently top of the Varsity Football table with a full haul of points, after winning their first three games. Individual brilliance has been key for the defending champions in their wins over UP-Tuks, UJ and NWU Mafikeng – against who Mlamla opened the scoring with a long-range piledriver.
Mlamla, though, chooses to talk about one of his teammates’ talents rather than boasting about his goal which broke the deadlock in a tense match against NWU – who he just as easily could have been playing for considering he was born and grew up in Rustenburg and spent time with Platinum Stars in the North-West province.
WATCH: Mlamla’s cracker and Lebitso terrorising NWU’s defence
“In the team, we don’t have any star players as we believe in team effort,” the 19-year-old starts off.
“However, I think Thabiso Lebitso is very good. His shifting and transition is out of this world. Additionally, his ability to take on defenders makes him a tough opponent,” Mlamla says of the TUT right-winger.
Mlamla, who is doing his second year of a National Diploma in Management Services, went on to say that following his coaches’ instructions is keeping him in the starting eleven – despite it being his first season of Varsity Football.
“We want to defend our title and win the tournament. On a personal level, I work hard and try to follow the coach’s instructions whenever given a chance to play,” concluded the talented young midfielder.
TUT will be looking to extend their unbeaten run against bottom-of-the-table UKZN when they meet on Thursday at Peter Booysen Stadium in Pietermaritzburg.
Tickets for the game, which kicks off at 18:30, are available for just R10 if you use the Varsity Sports App, downloadable from the Apple App Store on iOS devices or from the Google Play store for Android users.
By Lakhe Thwala
