Fadlu warns Maritzburg players of chop

Fadlu warns Maritzburg players of chop

Newly appointed Maritzburg United coach Fadlu Davids says players at the club have the next two weeks to impress him before decisions are made to reduce the squad size.

Following his return to the Team of Choice to replace John Maduka, the former Orlando Pirates tactician spoke to Sports Night Amplified host Andile Ncube on Tuesday and confirmed that he will be making changes to his pool of players.

œOf course, you know the players from watching this season and the one before, but only get to understand more details once you start working closely with them - you get to see how much information they can take and what is the right dosage, said Davids.

With Maritzburg rooted to the bottom of the table after 16 rounds of DStv Premiership fixtures, Davids gets to use the nearly two-month-long FIFA World Cup break to hit the ground running.

œIt™s at the initial stage of assessment, I have my ideas. It™s very important to check your biases in relation to what you™ve seen before and how they will adapt to your demands as a coach," he explained.

"It™s a different playing style, intensity and mechanisms. The good thing is that we have six weeks of preparation, in terms of getting the philosophy, to see if the players can adapt to me.

œIt™s clear that, when a new coach comes, there are going to be some players coming and some leaving. I want to give them a fair chance - one or two weeks, and then execute my plan in terms of which players are leaving and which players are coming in.

Davids has also moved quickly to strengthen his technical team with two former Pirates colleagues - veteran shot-stopper Wayne Sandilands joins as a goalkeeper coach, while the highly-rated former performance analyst Darian Wilken reunites with Davids as his first assistant coach.

The Team of Choice announced that Davids was returning to the club after being in charge before, but was sacked in December 2018 following a string of poor results, despite guiding them to the Nedbank Cup final a few months prior.

His first game back this time around will be a league clash against TS Galaxy on 30 December at Harry Gwala Stadium in Pietermaritzburg.

Davids™ last job was a huge opportunity in the Russian Premier League with Lokomotiv Moscow as assistant coach to former Bucs mentor Josef Zinnbauer, but that only lasted several weeks between September and October after the German was shown the door due to a string of poor results.

Zinnbauer was fired along with his entire backroom staff as well as the sporting director.

By Mazola Molefe