While unhappy to only draw on Tuesday against Maritzburg United, Cape Town City head coach Eric Tinkler said his team will take confidence from the result ahead of key DStv Premiership fixtures against Stellenbosch and Kaizer Chiefs.
City and Maritzburg played to a goalless draw at Athlone Stadium, and while City would’ve hoped to win the game, Tinkler was happy to stop the run of defeats and feels the players will be upbeat after keeping a clean sheet.
It was a first start in the 2022/2023 season for Bafana Bafana goalkeeper Darren Keet, who came into the side after Hugo Marques’ shock departure from the club.
When asked by iDiski Times journalist Rob Delport about the two upcoming fixtures, Tinkler said Tuesday’s result will make things a little easier, and says they will go into the next games with more confidence.
“No, I think they will be highly motivated for both games, like I said before, I think it’s made those two games a little bit easier because of our result,” Tinkler replied in the post-match press conference.
“As much as we are unhappy that we didn’t get the three points, the boys in the changing room, they’re upbeat, we kept a clean sheet, they’ve seen positives from the game.
“So I believe that this was an important result for us leading into those two very, very big games at the end of the day, because Stellies is the derby, we don’t have a good record against them from last season, because we lost both home and away.
“And then obviously, you’ve got the Chiefs game coming, so everybody wants to be involved and playing in that game.
“So like I said, I think they’ll be up for for the challenge. And then they obviously know, there’s the MTN8 (against AmaZulu), which is immediately after that. So there’s a lot to play for.
“And as we said to the guys, it’s four games in 12 days, and let’s push the reset button, forget about the first three and let’s focus on these – they’re all here at home, and if we get positive results from there, it changes our fortune.”
