By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Orlando Pirates revealed that Jose Riveiro and his technical team are set to make a number of changes in the way the team lines up, with a number of players coming back from injuries.
It is said that Riveiro isn’t pleased with the way things have turned out for them and he believes major changes have to happen.
Pirates had a good run in all competitions, but that was until they were brought down to earth by Jwaneng Galaxy in the first leg of the second preliminary round in the CAF Champions League.
That defeat was also followed by another loss to Mamelodi Sundowns in the league, and most recently, against Stellenbosch FC in the MTN8. However, Pirates still managed to go through to the final of the Wafa Wafa tournament, on the away goals rule.
However Riveiro is confident his side can overturn the first-leg defeat against Galaxy to qualify for the CAF Champions League group stage.
Look it doesn’t matter, it’s about us tomorrow to perform our best, it’s a home game against a good team, an opponent that is leading already 1-0, it’s a challenge but we love the challenges,” Riveiro said ahead of the second leg clash.
This one is an opportunity to prove that even in difficult circumstances, we can make it, we can be our best version tomorrow and the games we already played in the competition are not going to play tomorrow, it won’t be played tomorrow.
“What happened in Botswana is in the past and tomorrow we have the opportunity to write an important page in the club history, for our future, for many things like you hear with the captain, the players really want to go to the competition [group[ stages] and test themselves and test themselves against the best teams in the continent.
“So if tomorrow we don’t get a result that we’re not wishing, it’s not because of a lack of trying everything, it’s going to be difficult for us but it’s going to be even more difficult for the opponent for sure.”
Pirates captain Innocent Maela says he and his teammates are determined to overturn their one-goal deficit in their African Champions League tie and go on and book a place in the group phase.
“From the players’ perspective, it will mean everything for us to find ourselves in the group stages so that we can be able to compete with the best the continent has to offer,” Maela told a pre-match press conference on Thursday.
“That is what we want, that is our ambition as the group. We have an opportunity again to go out there to perform well and make sure that we will get the desired results.”
Maela said assertions that Pirates had proven complacent in the first leg in Gaborone were false.
“We expected a tough match, a very competitive match, a very tactical match. And there is what we got. So, I don’t think we went there with the mindset of being complacent, taking it easy thinking that you’re going to win. No, not at all. Because if you have that mindset, then you’ll have problems. So we went there with our focus, with our preparations spot on. Unfortunately, the result didn’t favour of us. But I believe we played really, really well and tomorrow there’s another opportunity to get things right,” the skipper added.
The game against Botswana’s Galaxy will kick off at 7.30pm on Friday and Pirates will need to beat the Galaxy cushion with two goals.
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Video Courtesy of Orlando Pirates.