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Mamelodi Sundowns coach Manqoba Mngqithi is confident his side has gradually brought back the fear factor from rival PSL clubs having returned to the summit.
Mngqithi explained why this worked to their advantage.
''I think the team is playing well, I don't think I am looking at this thing the wrong way. It is just that sometimes in our country we don't even watch football, we wait for the results. If it is positive it is a good performance, if it is negative it means it is bad performance, but personally I think the team is playing well.
It is strange because when I was talking to the team at the beginning of the season I said because of all the commotion, and everything that was surrounding - we will benefit a lot from being disrespected and that is what led to us scoring so many goals because most teams would think can go pond to pond and open themselves up, and we pushed them,'' said Mngqithi.
Perhaps the biggest indicator that Sundowns are once again a dominant force was evident in how Sekhukhune United took an ultra-defensive approach, but still ended up losing 3-0 to the reigning champions.
''I told the team at that time, there will be a stage where now you are respected - you will understand how difficult it is to win a football match, because when people start to respect you then they adopt strategies of trying to stop bleeding instead of trying to beat you, they try to make sure that they minimise the spaces behind them, and they try to minimise the goal attempts. And when they do that, it becomes very difficult and I am trying to make my team understand we are preparing for that phase. But when they are still giving us a chance because they disrespect us, we will have to punish them. I was hoping that would last for longer, because I enjoy being disrespected sometimes,'' added Mngqithi.
Mngqithi maintained that even in the matches they’ve lost so far this season, they had shown the potential to in fact be on the winning side.
He’s satisfied with the work put in behind the scenes.
''We are in that phase now where everybody says I must not concede five, if I concede one or two it's better. The respect is coming out of what these boys have done. And when you say they are not playing well, really I wonder what else you should be asking for, because what we should be asking ourselves is that why can't we force scoring goals even against teams that have a low block.
In the match against Magesi we got plus minus 20 short at goals but out of the 20 short at goal we could not get one more goal. Then you go the game against Maniema, I think we had about 17 short at goals, and out of the 17 we couldn't score one goal, and that is why we were pushing to try and get more clinical and I think they responded well in that regard, though I still maintain that we could have score far more than what we have scored,'' he expressed.
The Sundowns coach also spoke about managing striker Peter Shalulile, who is on the verge of being the club’s all-time leading goal scorer.
