Riveiro – Saleng’s Performances Speak For Itself

Orlando Pirates head coach Jose Riveiro says the Players Player of the Season award for Monnapule Saleng was fully merited for his incredible consistency.

The 25-year-old winger returned to Pirates after a season-long loan at Swallows where he was solid but unspectacular and it was not surprising to see him on the periphery of Riveiro’s squad at the start of his debut season as Thembinkosi Lorch and and Kabelo Dlamini started in their advanced midfield roles.

While his potential as a goal-scoring winger was never in doubt due to his exploits at Orbit College and in the second-tier with Free State Stars where he scooped a Golden Boot award with 13 league goals in the 2020/21 season, what arised this season was nothing short of remarkable.

After being allowed to join the African Nations Championship squad for Bafana Bafana, made up of mostly fringe PSL players and even free agents, he returned to Pirates and made his first league start in match week 10 in October.

It was a 0-0 draw against Richards Bay and the rest, as they say, is history as he went on to pummel 15 goals and 11 assists in 30 games across all competitions leading them to the MTN8 and Nedbank Cup titles as while as CAF Champions League qualification as league runners-up.

He managed to take advantage of the fitness and injury issues of Lorch and Vincent Pule and never looked back which culminated in the honour of the MTN8 Last Man Standing and Players’ Player of the Season nod.

“Individual awards… we need to put the spotlight somewhere every [season] and Monnapule Saleng, not only in the [league and Nedbank Cup], in the MTN8, the performance was outstanding,” Riveiro said on his Players Player of the Season award. 

“[The MTN8] was actually the tournament we all discovered Saleng, and his potential and capacity, the performances in the Nedbank Cup was exceptional, so he was very consistent during the whole season and there’s nothing else to say.

“His performances [speak for themselves], and then you know – people have the opportunity to see, evaluate, assess and make decisions [about the awards].”

Saleng himself stated he is targeting and even better season in terms of his goal-scoring metrics in the upcoming season in the latest edition of iDiski Times out now.