Mamelodi Sundowns head coach Rulani Mokwena has denied their Nedbank Cup exit at the hands of Stellenbosch is a wake-up call and reiterated they are still the best team in South African football at present.
Sundowns romped to a sixth consecutive league crown with a record seven games to spare and eased to the quarter-finals of the CAF Champions League in a near-perfect run since Mokwena was appointed as sole head coach of the club.
However, his first defeat in 24 games in charge saw them dumped out of the domestic cup competition at the quarter-final stage and end their pursuit for a treble this season.
“No, it’s not a wake-up, call, I don’t hide and I won’t hide in these moments, it’s where as leadership, as a coach I need to be held accountable,” Mokwena said when asked by iDiski Times if the run of four games without a win is a wake-up call for the Champions League.
“I am responsible for bad results, and yes it’s my responsibility to be in front, especially when the team is not doing well, so all the blame and responsibility falls on my head and as I said, I’m very proud of the players and what they have done this season.
“They not that and I have to say that even more now, I have to say it even more now that it doesn’t feel so good but we have to move and the person that has to take all the responsibility is me.”
Mokwena went on to state that the performance and loss does not shake of his belief that the squad is capable of bouncing back to win Africa’s elite club competition this season as he once again quantified how challenging their title triumph – made to look easy – was to achieve.
“The hard one always is the league, that’s a competition where you have to be consistent to win it, it’s not always the best team that wins the cup, sometimes it’s the rub of the green to get the results,” he added.
“And I think even though they were better than us, they also had moments where they had more luck than us, we had a couple of shouts, an offside call for Peter is marginal if offside at all. A very close incident for a penalty for a handball but it doesn’t fall on our side and these things happen in football.
“I’ve never spoken about referees and I won’t do it now, because when we win, I say nothing about the referees, so when we lose I can’t make the responsible and start talking about them – but that’s the situation.
“What I said this entire season, I will echo, not enough credit has gone to this team for what they have done and for being clearly, by far the best team in the league, and when you hear the opposition coaches, who also have a competitive streak in them saying, clearly they are the second best team in the country.
“And some have come out to say that, because Sundowns is the benchmark and by far the best team in the country – but that’s not good enough, you’re only as good as your lasy performance in football and in any other sport.
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“So we have to prove every single day, every single session, match – that we are the best team in the country and that means we have the responsibility, pressure to play with that tag behind us which is the hardest thing.
“But it’s the best thing to give you a competitive edge and give you and keep you going, unfortunately, we didn’t have that [against Stellenbosch] and we lost to, as I said, on the day – the better side.”
Sundowns will now travel to Algeria to face CR Belouizdad at the Nelson Mandela Stadium in Algiers for their first league Champions League quarter-final next week.
