Erasmus puts five star show as Sundowns rout hapless Dynamos

It was as though Mamelodi Sundowns fans said to Kermit Erasmus: ‘Romeo, wang kolota’ after he promised the side to score a lot of goals when he signed for Sundowns back in 2020, but limited chances and injuries have hampered his success at Masandawana.

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But on Saturday night, he netted a brace against Summerfield Dynamos in the Nedbank Cup, helping the capital city giants ease past the ABC Motsepe League team from KwaZulu-Natal.

Man-of-the-Match Gaston Sirino opened the scoring of the 5-0 thumping of Clinton Larsen’s side as he celebrated a rare start with a goal in the eighth minute.

After months of asking and guessing how it would be if Lesedi Kapinga and Neo Maema were to start a game together – well, all guesses were laid to rest as the duo were named in the line-up alongside each other for the first time since they signed for the club.

Their combination created the second goal where Maema was the provider. Kapinga scored in the 12th minute and the two had a chance to combine again some five minutes later, but Kapinga took too much time on the ball and in the end, he was dispossessed of the ball.

Sirino then took over the show, playing an assist to Erasmus once again in the 52nd minute where he could have easily taken the chance himself but showed a lot of unselfishness and laid it on for his teammate. Seven minutes later, Sirino took his markers to the cleaners down the right wing before delivering a sublime cross to Erasmus, who made no mistake and completed his brace.

The fifth and final nail to the coffin was hit by substitute Pavol Safranko, who returned back to action after missing three games because of injury. He impressively scored in his first touch, scoring a fine header from a Sirino cross, completing his hat-trick of assists as Downs marched on to the semifinals. 

In the other quarterfinal match played earlier on the day, Marumo Gallants edged fellow Limpopo side Baroka 1-0 to reach the semifinals of the competition.

Sede Dion scored the only goal of the match.