Kaizer Chiefs coach Nasreddine Nabi was pleased with the team’s victory over beleaguered Richards Bay on Wednesday night – but said the playing standard was below expectation.
Chiefs played the second half with 10 players after defender Reeve Frosler was sent off for an early shower following two yellow cards.
Even then, Richards Bay battled to drive home the advantage, although they managed a consolation goal from Yanele Mbuthuma in the dying minutes as the match ended 2-1 in Chiefs’ favour.
This Richards Bay team have one win in eight outings, and Nabi was justifiably disappointed that the Amakhosi did not produce a performance of which the famous club can be proud.
The Tunisian mentor said he was busy with a project at Naturena to raise the level of play so that Chiefs could match the glory days of the past, when icons like Doctor Khumalo and Siphiwe Tshabalala wowed the audiences with their skills.
“The process is not for one (match). It’s not because we win, the process is done. The level must be very high at Kaizer Chiefs,” said Nabi.
“We need to do more work in the third zone. This is not the Kaizer Chiefs of Tshabalala and Doctor Khumalo. We need to get to that level.
“The object for the level of Kaizer Chiefs is very, very high. I think the mentality is good. Some moments in the game are good.
“But without consistency and efficiency for the third goal, we need to do more work.
“The three points are good for the club. Mentally it was not easy to play the second half with 10 men. It feels good, but as for the process, it is far from done.”
Despite the numerical disadvantage, Chiefs dominated the second half.
But apart from one goal, they failed to exploit their good fortunes in the firing zone.
Wandile Duba opened the scoring in the 21st minute, and Ashley du Preez grabbed what turned out to be the winning strike in the 68th minute.
“This (missed scoring opportunities) is a big problem for the team. It is not only in this game. Maybe against all the teams we played against, we created many such opportunities without scoring,” said Nabi.
“Maybe it is the confidence of the strikers, or maybe the focus. I don’t know, but we will work hard.”
Chiefs will host struggling Royal AM tomorrow at the Peter Mokaba Stadium in Polokwane (8pm kick-off), and by the sound of things, three players seem assured of places in the starting line-up.
They are Du Preez, Sibongiseni ‘Ox’ Mthethwa and Pule Mmodi – all of whom were surprise starters, but were impressive in their 2-1 win over Richards Bay in Polokwane on Wednesday.
Du Preez replaced Ranga Chivaviro, and the injured Edson Castillo made way for Mthethwa, and Mmodi featured instead of Gaston Sirino.
“Very happy with the players that started, especially Ashley,” said Nabi. “It’s going to give him more confidence going forward.
“Ox put in an unbelievable performance. Mmodi did his job very well, but we believe they can all do better.”
After Frosler’s red card, Nabi said he was forced to make changes he had not planned.
“They were by necessity because of the circumstances of the game after the red card in the first five minutes of the second half,” said Nabi.
“Then you need to put (Dillan) Solomons as a right back. We changed our set-up in the back five when we introduced TT (Thatayaone Ditlhokwe) and (Samkelo) Zwane in the midfield.
“In the end, we added (Christian) Saile because we wanted to block the width and block the centre of the field, because we noticed that they had height when going on attack.
“There were a lot of crosses and a lot of long balls.
“We needed to put people that can deal with that, and those changes we believe helped us to get the three points.”