Orlando Pirates coach Jose Riveiro doesn't want exclusive credit for promoting youngsters from the club's development ranks, maintaining it was a collective effort to get them ready for the first team.
Right-back Siyabonga Ndlozi, 22, and 19-year-old centre-back Mbekezeli Mbokazi are the latest Pirates development graduates to crack it at the first team under Riveiro, following in the footsteps of Relebohile Mofokeng and Thabiso Sesane as the prodigies from the side's youth structures.
Ndlozi and Mbokazi, who was making his debut in the first team, put in a solid defensive display when Bucs beat Chippa United 1-0 in the league at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium on Wednesday. Ndlozi had already made four cameos off the bench.
The pair are likely to keep their berths in the starting XI when Pirates face SuperSport United in the Nedbank Cup quarterfinals at the Old Peter Mokaba Stadium tomorrow (3pm). Mbokazi is expected to partner with Tapelo Xoki at the heart of defence with Nkosinathi Sibisi, who scored their solitary goal against Chippa, suspended.
“It can be easy for me to take credit but it doesn't belong only to me. Credit should go to the whole club. The club has ambitions, has a plan,'' Riveiro said during a press conference at Nedbank headquarters in Sandton yesterday.
“It's not only Riveiro supporting those players. It's not by chance [that he's giving youngsters from the club's development ranks chances]. We are not gambling when we choose the players, we're not experimenting. When the boys are ready and when the boys are good, we try to make them confident, that's probably the most important thing in our role, to make sure that when they go onto the field, they can be themselves because, again, they're ready.”
Pirates are looking to be the first team to win the Ke Yona Cup in three successive seasons. “We have to try to find the best solution to be better than SuperSport to make sure that we have a possibility, and we deserve to go to the semifinals one more time,'' Riveiro said.
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