Al Ahly not the strongest in Africa, says Sundowns coach Mngqithi

Mamelodi Sundowns co-head coach Manqoba Mngqithi believes that defending Caf Champions League champions, Al-Ahly, are currently not the strongest on the continent at the moment.

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This comes after Masandawana did the ‘double’ over Pitso Mosimane’s side in the group stages and qualified for the knockout stages.

The two losses left the Red Devils with all to do in their remaining two games.

“I would not want to take the wins against Al-Ahly and get carried away. The fact is that they have played far too many matches and they are not as fresh as other teams,” said Mngqithi.

“If we are fair, they are probably close to 60 matches this season and that makes them not as sharp as we know them to be, they can still be very dangerous when given time. They played a very tough match last week Tuesday against Pyramids and they won that match. They came to us knowing that they lost their right-back and other players in the process and they were not at the level at which they can be when they are fresh and have all their ammunition.

“Inasmuch as I would love to take the credit for winning the match, I don’t want us to think this was the strongest team that we could have played in the Champions League this year,” he added.

Teams like Petro Atletico have also booked a place in the last eight, while teams like Raja Casablanca and Esperance de Tunis are wins away from booking spots in the quarterfinals.

“When I look at Raja, Wydad Casablanca, and Esperance, those are strong teams. Zamalek are already out of the group, they cannot advance any further and that tells you that there are other strong teams out there. We cannot get carried away and start to think we are bigger,” said the Masandawana mentor.

“We must be realistic and say the players have done good work against this team and have given us an opportunity to qualify for the quarterfinals very early. It is positive in the sense that we can give a little bit more effort and attention to the DStv Premiership and the Nedbank Cup before we go to the quarterfinals. It is very good in terms of morale that we won two matches against Al-Ahly but there is still a lot to fight for,” he added.