Ndlovu upbeat
Boitumelo Khutsafalo | Monday February 16, 2015 13:32
Rollers host Chiefs at the National Stadium in Gaborone after going down 2-1 in the first leg played at FNB Stadium on Saturday evening.
Ndlovu said that his players now know what Kaizer Chiefs is really like and will be ready in the second match. “Yes the feeling in the dressing room is that we could have done better. They are sorry that they could not get a draw but there is a smile on their faces and they believe they can do well in the second leg,” he said. Ndlovu said Rollers started the second half very well hence they got an equalizer. “I think we did well on the first three minutes of the first five minutes of the second half but then we lost concentration on the last two minutes of the last five minutes of the match,” he said.
He admitted that Chiefs are a very good side who play very entertaining football. “The first few minutes of the game, my boys gave Chiefs too much respect. I think maybe it is because of the levels that we and Chiefs play at,” he added. Towards the end of the game, Chiefs’ defender, Tshepo Masilela seemed to struggle with an injury, but remained on the pitch since Chiefs had absorbed their substitution quota. Ndlovu said they tried to capitalise on that by switching Koko to that side since he (Koko) still had the energy to run at him.
“However we had to be careful not to be carried away by Masilela’s knock because had we tried to push more numbers forward, we could have opened gaps and risked being punished,” he said.
Kaizer Chiefs coach, Stuart Baxter hailed Rollers for their performance and admitted they looked dangerous on counter attacks. “We started well and got a goal. We then backed off I do not know why. They are a good team and showed that they can punish us if we play like this,” he said. Baxter said their strategy was not to give the ball away too easily but struggled to keep it on the day. “I have never seen my midfield give the ball away like that. We had wanted to keep a clean sheet. It was also difficult to penetrate them as well as to restrict them on hitting us on counter attacks,” Baxter said in a post match press conference.