Johnson’s methods beginning to pay off

AmaZulu looked a good bet to go straight back down to the National First Division as they didn’t have the best first half of the season and then started the New Year with successive defeats, with talk abounding that Johnson was about to lose his job.

However, they bounced back with three wins and two draws in their last five league games, and now sit in the top eight, heading into this evening’s KwaZulu-Natal derby at Maritzburg United.

“I think the catalyst has been that players are starting to realise you are not in the NFD, you are in the Premiership, and it is a lot more technical,” Johnson told Phakaaathi Plus yesterday.

“Your brain has to work a bit better. In the NFD you have the Under-23 rule and this and that … but in the Premiership it is as it is supposed to be, one step higher. I thought that even at the beginning of the season we had a lot of good games, but now the penny has dropped that if we don’t play in a certain way we will not get anywhere.”

He also pointed to a lack of experience in his squad as being a bit of a problem at first.

“Besides the older guys, Siyabonga Nomvethe and Mabudi Khenyeza, the team is very young,” he said.

“We haven’t reinforced with too much experience, even with guys like Michael Morton, Rhulani Manzini and Boalefa Pule, those players were not really regulars at their (former) clubs, but they are coming to the fore now … I think the team came back in 2018 and realised that if we didn’t pull our fingers out of our backsides and listen, we would arrive at a problem.”

Johnson will be without the suspended Morton and the injured Manzini for tonight, and is well aware of the difficulty of facing Maritzburg United, enjoying a fine season under Fadlu Davids.
United are sixth in the table, two points ahead of AmaZulu, and just five behind second-placed Orlando Pirates.

“You have to be impressed with Maritzburg, and playing there on a Friday makes it a bit more difficult. They have made it (the Harry Gwala Stadium) their home. Fadlu Davids has to be given credit for building the team to where it is now. We will prepare as best we can, and put up a fight,” added the AmaZulu coach.