Mamelodi Sundowns coach Miguel Cardoso is impressed with the contribution of Monnapule Saleng after his debut during their 3-1 victory over Sekhukhune United at Loftus Versfeld Stadium on Sunday.
The former Orlando Pirates midfielder came off the bench to make an immediate impact as he created the second goal scored by Iqraam Rayners and injected some pace into Sundowns’ attack.
Saleng did well; he is a player that has quality, a player that wins his own duels.
— Miguel Cardoso, Mamelodi Sundowns coach
Cardoso believes Saleng will help them as they look to defend their league title, but won’t be putting pressure on him.
“It’s clear that teams need players that can be aggressive towards defenders, and those players need to start, but a team like Sundowns also needs players that do that from the bench in moments where teams are tired or broken,” Cardoso told the media during the post-match press conference.
“Saleng did well; he is a player that has quality, a player that wins his own duels and can play left or right wing.
“Unfortunately, I only started working with him because he was injured, but he made a fantastic recovery; we don’t want to put pressure on his comeback.
“I just hope he also understands everything moving forward because we support him very much.”
Cardoso was also pleased with Rayners, who netted a brace to help them secure the three points.
“We are all happy; I think he had difficult moments. Let’s hope he understands everything so he can move forward in the right direction.
“We support all our strikers. Lebo Mothiba has been doing an important job from the moment he played against Pirates, [showing] how he helped the team to press. So, we are happy when the players give their best and have their minds clean so they can perform,” he said.
After his side collected three points to go level with Orlando Pirates on 41 in the title race, Cardoso was pleased with his side’s attitude and challenged them to continue collecting points against Golden Arrows in Pretoria on Wednesday at 7.30pm.
“We need to fight for all the points for our objective, and we need to create that commitment. Anyway, teams that fight like this until the end usually get rewarded; today (Sunday), indeed that happened.
“And I think if we see the last three matches we’ve played, we played Sekhukhune [at] home, AmaZulu away, [and] Pirates away; it’s a tough road, and the boys did well.
“Again, congratulations to all of them; it’s not easy to play.”
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