“After 10 minutes I thought to myself, ‘oh my God what am I involved in here,” said Kaizer Chiefs coach, Gavin Hunt after guiding the team to a win in his first game in charge of the Soweto giants, coming from behind to beat Maritzburg United 2-1 and advance to the MTN8 semifinals.
Hunt could only watch in horror as his team chased shadows in the first half with just a little luck stopping them from going into half time trailing by a bigger margin, considering the chances that the Blue Hearts created at FNB Stadium on Sunday afternoon.
But Amakhosi came back a better side for the second half and an unlikely brace from defender Yagan Sasman helped them overturn the scoreline and win the match.
“I thought in the first half we were all over the show. We were really poor and they did well and pressed us. They played balls behind us which we couldn’t deal with. And then we changed one or two things and I thought in the second half we were much better. We had some opportunities and we could have made it safer, but it’s not anything to come from behind. The most important thing was to go through,” said Hunt in a post-match media interview.
“I thought in midfield we were not picking up the second ball and we went getting our foot in and not getting close to them. We brought on (Leonardo) Castro and he gave is something tolay to. He was not fully fit and I didn’t think he would last the 45 minutes and I was thinking if we go to extra time I was goin to have to replace him. And it was much better,” said the former Bidvest Wits mentor.
“After 10 minutes I thought ‘oh my God what am I involved in here?’ But I knew and I could see it. It will take a little bit of time and of course everyone is different but we are going to try. We can talk about it but I don’t like talking, I want to do. I just prefer working more on the training ground and maybe what we need to do… I saw a number of things today that we need to do better.
“But I’ve only been here for two-weeks-and-a-half, and I don’t even know the names of some of the players yet. So, it will take a bit of time.
“The most important thing is the mentality. I always make sure that mentality and game intelligence are the biggest things I work on. That is knowing what to do, and the right time (to do them). We showed great mentality in the second half because we could have have folded and but we came back for it. Game intelligence? That can only come from the training ground,” said Hunt.
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