Amakhosi suffered their third loss of the season against the Citizens who earned their first three points of the campaign with a 2-0 victory at Cape Town Stadium on Tuesday evening.
As a result, the Soweto giants are sitting in 10th place on the DStv Premiership log with only six points from a possible 15.
Speaking after the match, Arthur Zwane explained how his charges failed in their plan against Eric Tinkler’s side.
“When we analyzed them, we knew, you know, they’ve got very good players on the ball. We said, let’s also pack the middle because we believe we’ve also got the players that could match them pound for pound. Also, with the belief that we’ve got Solly (Dillan Solomons) who’s very, very explosive on the side and Reeve (Frosler) on the other side. But I don’t think we read the situation very, very well and also tried to correct with Reeve. Several times Reeve was free, but we still wanted to play the ball short,” he said, speaking to journalists after the clash.
The entertaining encounter saw both teams play some exciting football with the Citizens scoring twice, while Amakhosi were poor in the final third.
Khama Billiat and Siyabonga Ngezana were among the Chiefs players who underperformed on the night.
Ngezana was surprisingly recalled to the starting line probably due to his aerial prowess.
However, Ngezana failed to use his towering height when the Soweto giants were defending crosses and set-pieces with his marking being poor. He was bullied by Wayde Lekay on the night.
Phathutshezo Nange failed to impress on his return to the team.
Nange was playing as a deep-lying midfielder, but he offered no resistance to City and couldn’t get his team going. He was substituted just after the hour mark.
On the far extreme end, Khama Billiat exhibited a very poor performance! Somehow Billiat, who is a good dribbler, struggled to beat his markers in one-on-one situations and he also gave away possession when Chiefs were looking to attack. He failed to take accurate shots at goal.
Cape Town City tactician Eric Tinkler has given an account of how Kaizer Chiefs' rather peculiar back-three system proved advantageous for them.
"To a degree, I think Chiefs playing with a back-three did play into our hands because we knew that could allow our full-backs to have a little bit more space," Tinkler said.
"They ended up playing with five because [Dillan] Solomons was playing very deep and [Reeve] Frosler was also playing very deep. So we knew that once they come out, to come and press, the space will be in the channels in the wide areas and you'd now be pulling those centre-backs out of comfortable positions inside."
As a coach, Tinkler has now beaten Chiefs 10 times in 21 attempts, making Amakhosi the side he's beaten the most. The Citizens trainer insinuated he had no secret as to why he's been successful against the Soweto giants.
"I don't know why, [that he's beaten Chefs more than any team] to be honest. I can't really answer that one to be honest, but funny enough this morning [on Tuesday] I thought about it, saying that actually I have been very successful against them and hopefully that success continues today so we can turn the corner," Tinkler said.
