Sekhukhune plotting biggest Carling Cup upset against Pirates

Sekhukhune United will be facing Orlando Pirates at the Orlando Stadium on Saturday afternoon, and their goal is one, to cause an upset and eliminate the defending champions from this season’s Carling Knockout Cup.

Sekhukhune and Pirates will meet in a quarterfinal tie, with the winner set to join Mamelodi Sundowns in the semis.

Despite already suffering three defeats at the hands of the Buccaneers this season – once in the Betway Premiership and twice in the two-legged MTN8 semi-finals – “Babina Noko” coach Papi Zothwane says the Carling Knockout Cup will be a different ball game altogether.

READ: Sundowns march on to Carling Cup semis after hard-fought win over Arrows

“You can’t dwell on the past based on what happened in our past results against Orlando Pirates. It’s a new game,” Zothwane said during a pre-match press conference at the PSL offices in Parktown on Thursday.

“Our job as coaches is to give the players confidence, give them the structure, and make them aware of the strengths and weaknesses of Pirates.

“It can’t be played the same way. We must change [approach] a bit. We still want to keep the consistency of the team because we feel that in the past six games the team has done very well,” Zothwane added.

READ: Pirates are protecting our diamond Oswin Appollis, says coach Abdeslam Ouaddou

Bucs coach Abdeslam Ouaddou has since warned his side against complacency, suggesting that their three wins over Sekhukhune this season must not deceive his players into thinking that the knockout clash will be easy.

“I have warned my players that this will be one of our toughest games under the current coach, Papi Zothwane,” said Ouaddou.

“While he was there during our previous meetings, I don’t believe he had fully implemented his ideas then; now, he is firmly in charge. If I remember correctly, we struggled against Richards Bay when he was involved. This will be a very difficult game; we must be at our best to win.”

The game is scheduled to get underway at 3pm.

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