Lack of match fitness, nerves and a late pre-season camp, are some of the factors that affected Wits’ poor start to their Varsity Football campaign.
The Clever Boys were out-paced, out played and dismantled 4-0 by NWU in their opening game. In their second match against UP-Tuks they still showed signs of being rusty and committed schoolboy errors to succumb to a 2-0 defeat against their rivals. But in the third time of asking, they finally got it right with a morale boosting 1-0 victory over the University of Cape Town.
In the condition that they entered the popular Varsity Football competition, modest coach Karabo Mogudi conceded that they were presented with a daunting task of playing against what he described as possible finalists Tuks and NWU.
But they have past the first hurdle of playing the top two top teams favoured to win the tournament. Can they trigger a winning run of matches to book a semifinal spot after their first win?
Mogudi says anything is possible and now that they have a win and a goal under their belt they can conjure up a victory against the University of Western Cape at home on Monday night.
Mogudi said: “We had issues with regard to fatigue and conditioning and conceded goals from our own errors and need to rectify this. We had issues with communication on the pitch and as soon as we fix this we will go places. We didn’t really have pre-season and normally you need six weeks for a team to gel and our players are still finding each other.
“We will get better as time goes on it’s important to come up with a positive results in front of our home fan we need the three points in our next match,” he added.
Western Cape teams are known for their set piece play and Wits and Mogudi will be alert to the danger.
“A win is a must the players must demand that we have to win the game. We have to get into the top four of the tournament.”
Mogudi added that their next match will be a real test of what’s to come from their remaining matches.
“We have a young team and we lost five strong regular players from last season and it’s tough to re-build again. Lehlohonolo Makutle was our midfield genius and he did everything accordingly. And now the others are basically catching up on how he was playing and how I want them to play.
“I think that the mental resolve from the players is not yet there but they will improve with time and definitely grow and mature. This tournament is not for the feint hearted it’s a tough tournament and if you’re feint hearted you won’t survive.”
By Charles Baloyi
