Wydad Atheltic Club head coach Sven Vandenbroeck believes Al Ahly won’t dominate them in the final in the manner Mamelodi Sundowns did in the semi-finals.
In what was a remarkable achievement for the reigning champions, after Vandenbroeck – and several other coaches in the competition – lauded Sundowns as the best team in Africa, he admitted it was a case of suffering for the progression to meet the Egyptian giants.
Having been appointed two weeks prior, the former Simba SC head coach said he kept up with the competition and worked more on the mental aspect of galvanising his team than actual football training tactics since succeeding Juan Carlos Garrido.
“When you go in such games and have the feeling after anaylsing the opponent that they have a lot of strengths, then you go to defence and mental training,” he said when asked how mentally draining preparation was for Sundowns after 15 days after his arrival.
“To reunite everyone, we did a special mental training and exercise that I got from a psychologist in Belgium that I do for many years and it helps because you can see that everyone’s attitude [changed] in a short period of time.
“So when you arrive and you don’t have a lot of information and I don’t want to listen to everyone because everyone will [overload information], I wanted to see with my own eyes, it helped me a lot to analyse the team; who is the leader, who is is carrying the water etc…
“From this point of view, you set up your tactics and I think it went well… but especially the guys picked up very well. We can provide things but in the end it’s the players who do the job on the pitch.
“We can guide them, we can give them instructions, but they can do it, they have to show the quality and the mentality to do it and they did very well – so it’s a massive compliment, not to me, but the players.”
When pressed on how exactly from a tactical perspective set his side up at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday afternoon, Vandenbroeck, who is now still in contention for four trophies with the Botola Pro giants admitted it was more focusing on his to defend against Sundowns.
“When I started analysing Sundowns, I think my full staff was aware of their qualities and strengths, you could feel during the two games when Sundowns takes the ball, they push us back, even when we press or don’t press,” he said.
“They have passing skills and dribbling skills in midfield, upfront, even in defence, and we knew it was going to be a very difficult game and we did almost 70% defensive work in training – who goes out, who stays, who picks out the midfielder on the opposite side.
“But still because they move so good and turn the whole game around, it’s difficult to pick up people, so sometimes, that’s communication and then there’s the fans, when you have 60 to 70 thousand, you don’t hear what someone says 10 meters away.
– Advertisement –
“So that’s the experience that comes up, and a team like Wydad in the semi-finals for the last five years, you can see this maturity and experience helped us a lot over the two legs.
“It’s the same final as last year, so I can imagine Al Ahly want revenge over Wydad but I think it will be an even more balanced game than this semi-final, because Sundowns dominated, against Al Ahly I think we can play more of our own game, I know them well.”
Wydad return home now for a quarter-final tie in the Throne Cup against Difaâ Hassani El Jadidi on Wednesday evening.
