Ruthless Sundowns unstoppable? Mngqithi rejects championship talk

Mamelodi Sundowns are five wins and a draw away from reaching last season’s DStv Premiership winning tally of 67 points, but for Downs coach Manqoba Mngqithi, the target is beyond that as they are in pole position to win the league five times on the spin. The Masandawana mentor suggested that the league is not something that put high up on their priority list, modestly saying they are more focused on their performances.

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“Our focus is never really on the championship that much, we have our own processes that we focus on because that’s where we gauge ourselves,” said Mngqithi.  

“As to whether the championship is gone or not, it is not really what we focus on but we look at our milestones that we want to achieve. Even if the championship can be won earlier, we will still focus on bettering our performances of last season and maybe try and get closer to the unthinkable in terms of the number of points, we are not really looking at the gap that everybody else is focused on,” he added.

Sundowns come at the back of a 3-0 win against struggling TS Galaxy, in a game that saw some outstanding goals from Haashim Domingo and Khuliso Mudau. In the end, Mudau was named Man-of-the-Match and his mentor feels it is about time he gets recognized by Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos.  

“Mudau has done well from the beginning of the season until now and he has been one of our standout performers, that is why he is making life difficult for Thapelo Morena in that space. We still believe that he still has a little bit more to give because the potential of that boy is bigger than what everybody thinks,” he said.  

Mngqithi added: “Defensively he is very solid and he has a lot of qualities in attack, he can also play as a central midfielder, which is what helps him to be able to solve some technical and tactical problems that are demanded in the game. He is one of the few modern full-backs that can invert and play in a central position and be comfortable in taking opponents one-on-one. He is also very quick and he wins a lot of duals, his stats are always on the rise and it is only a matter of time until the national team coach sees him but I am very confident that he will get into the national team very soon.”