Stellies shift focus to Carling Cup title defense after MTN8 setback

The draw was conducted on Tuesday and Stellies will face AmaZulu, who have just appointed Arthur Zwane and Vusumuzi Vilakazi as co-coaches, away in the opening round of the cup.

Stephens insists they need to immediately move on. 

"No, I think it definitely helps, like you said the nice is that it shows that we're competing. To come off the back of a cup final, come to the launch and know your opponents and being the defending champions, it's special, it shows that Stellensbosch is competing like we want to, like we aim to and it makes us feel very proud and humble at the same time," Stephens said.

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The veteran goal minder revealed there were processes in place to help players who might be finding it difficult to get over the controversial 3-1 loss in the MTN8.

"We're getting huge support, you know, not only from the people in Stellenbosch, the rest of the country with the messages that come through of support. Unfortunately, we cannot control what happened in the MTN8 final but like I said it's gone now and definitely we've put things in place to help players through this because it's difficult to lose a cup final,” he added.

“It's not easy and the biggest thing and the best players, they learn to forget. So, that's something that we're gonna have to apply at Stellenbosch, we need to learn to forget this event."