The Greek Queens march on with winning streak

Six games into the 2021 season of the Gauteng Sasol Women’s League and Balfour team Croesus Ladies remains unbeaten.

They dethroned Wits Ladies three weeks ago when they beat them 1–0 in a top-of-the-table clash. The Greek Queens, as they are popularly known, were joint leaders on points with Wits but the Balfour side had an inferior goal difference.

Last weekend on 8 May, Croesus emerged 4–1 winners in their home encounter against Rosina Sedibane-Modiba Sports School Ladies of Centurion, and on 15 May they hosted another home game against Soweto Fabulous Ladies in which they won 2–1.

But Greek Queen’s manager Maria Athanassouli bemoaned the lack of goals in their winning streak as that may come back to haunt the side if the league winners were decided on goal difference.

“We create so many chances that go begging and this ‘thinning’ in goals worries me. If we can convert all the opportunities we create then we can build on our goal difference which may be the cherry on the top for us in case of points tie at the end of the season,” she told Alex News.

The super culprit for the Greek Queens of the wasted chances against Fabulous was former Silver Spears Ladies right-winger Kedibone Mateya. She missed three clear-cut goals, one of which was one-on-one with the keeper but she shot wide of the posts while the other two were ballooned over the crossbar.

However, Mateya did assist her goal-poaching machine teammate Lerato ‘Pele’ Ruele who netted the only goal of the first half.

The Greek Queens’ goal prompted a sustained and resolute attempt by Fabulous to find an equalising goal but to no avail. In one of the many scrambles to shut down a determined Fabulous side, Mokgadi Seanego earned herself a yellow card while teammate Kathrine ‘Kat’ Maguire came out tops as she twice blocked potential goal strikes from the marauding Soweto side forwards.

In the second stanza of the game, the Soweto team continued where they left off but could not penetrate the wall of defence marshalled by Maguire. Stocky but agile Croesus forward, Zandile Mxasa messed up a sitter with the keeper at her mercy.

Croesus was awarded a penalty when a Fabulous player handled the ball in the box and their keeper Philadelphia ‘TK’ Mndaweni put up her hand and made no mistake to give her team a 2–0 lead.

That lead was short-lived though as Relebogile Mohlokoane broke the scoring jinx that her team was experiencing when she netted after which Alex referee Florence Moshupya blew the final whistle.

Fabulous coach Peter Mathebula said he could not falter his charges and said they ‘died fighting’ despite what he described as ‘flimsy’ refereeing.

His Greek Queens counterpart Barnes Qina said she was disappointed with the missed chances but what mattered were the three points collected.

“We’re going to emphasise more on our striking abilities at our training sessions in the hope of converting the majority of the chances we create.”