The Buccaneers, thanks to goals from Oupa Manyisa and Andile Jali, have pulled level with Amakhosi on 31 points at the top of the table but remain in second due to an inferior goal difference. The Team of Choice, who had Ruben Cloete sent off early in the second half, scored their consolation goal through Cuthbert Malajila.
After a competitive first 30 minutes, Pirates broke the deadlock: Daine Klate wriggled free of the attentions of Rheece Evans down the right flank before picking out an unmarked Oupa Manyisa at the far post. The midfielder controlled the cross before steering a low shot past goalkeeper Shu-aib Walters.
Maritzburg made a change at the start of the second half, with Evans making way for Thabang Matuka, and they nearly forced an equaliser in the 48th minute when goalkeeper Senzo Meyiwa dropped a cross, but Terrence Mandaza was unable to get his attempted shot on target.
Yet on 50 minutes former Pirates defender Ruben Cloete let the Team of Choice down when he dived into a studs-up challenge on Thandani Ntshumayelo. Referee Daniel Bennett had no choice but to show him a red card, reducing the home side to 10 men.
Seven minutes later Pirates took full advantage with a speedy counter-attack before Collins Mbesuma provided a cross that was headed home by Andile Jali to make it 2-0.
With just over 10 minutes to play Maritzburg pulled a goal back. A Delron Buckley pass into the penalty area was only half-cleared by Happy Jele, teeing the ball up for Cuthbert Malajila to drive a shot into the top corner of the net and reduce the deficit to 2-1.
Your comments on this story...
Bhakaniya for life
Stop fooling yourselves chiefs won't win the league...Baxter is a proven and given failure.....
Fact bucks took the 3 points.... Bucks are on 31 points.... The rest will be confirmed afte 5 pm Sunday.
Bah kamiya for life...
Mbuyane was saying in the next edition of the Champions League we must be ruthless. Yes that I agree with. But he also mentioned we must forget about asthetics and focus on effeminacy. Now that I don't subscribe to. Last time we reached the semi finals in Africa we were playing sumptuous football. The kind of football that would move you and fill you with emotion.
Some might argue it's not possible to win playing pretty. Of course many teams in the past have disproven that. I shall not refer to Barcelona as many Buccaneers like doing but I shall refer to Zidane's Real Madrid: The Galacticos! On a technical level only Okonkwo and Benni are world class in this team. Roger needs to develop systemics discipline - something we lost after the second goal as we were all over the place - that is what makes teams win. Over and above that, he needs to infuse individual freedom of expression. Systemic discipline combined with freedom of expression results in playing pretty winning football. That is what we want to see!
Football 101 was indoctrinated at the University of Orlando
Wat a bad performance from my team and we always play like this every time we play 3 defensive MD.This is the same formation that cost us the Telkom cup.Anyways 3 points is all that was needed at the end.That tackle from Cloete deserved a straight red.
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I berg to differ my champ. It is the 3 man center midfield that got us 3 goals to begin with in that Telkom match. In fact, last night Manyisa scored, Jali scored and Bibo was man of the match proving that 3 man so called defensive midfield works. It is defensive and attacking in the same measure. Given that we really have no number 10 at Pirates, cause Myeni is on and off in that position as we saw in the Derby, the best thing for us to do is to play this 4 3 3. It makes use of our many central midfielders.
Give it some time champ, it is the only system that we should play
posted: 09:56 pm | Report
Referee assisted win. U can call
me names is fine. The ref didnt
protect Maritzburg players. Jali
could have bv given a booking.
Khosi until end of ages.
…............
You can go and suck majoros balls for all I care.
when Rud Krol was fired frm pirates, reason \"not palying attractive football\"
the only game that pirates played well was against Leopards.
if i were to compare how chiefs and pirates play at the moment i will gladly go and watch kaizer chiefs play.
the good thing about pirates is they are collecting points, but roger de sa should be a worried man, he has the best squad yet his team is playing \"Skop and donor\"
when Roger was a wits coach they always do badly in the second half of the league.
NB:i m nt a chiefs or pirates supporter
posted: 05:26 am | Report
Champ Mriyo (Trebble kings
of SA)posted: 05:16 am | Report
Wat a bad performance from my team and we always
play like this every time we play 3 defensive MD.This is
the same formation that cost us the Telkom cup.Anyways
3 points is all that was needed at the end.That tackle
from Cloete deserved a straight red.
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I berg to differ my champ. It is the 3 man center midfield
that got us 3 goals to begin with in that Telkom match. In
fact, last night Manyisa scored, Jali scored and Bibo was
man of the match proving that 3 man so called defensive
midfield works. It is defensive and attacking in the same
measure. Given that we really have no number 10 at
Pirates, cause Myeni is on and off in that position as we
saw in the Derby, the best thing for us to do is to play
this 4 3 3. It makes use of our many central midfielders.
Give it some time champ, it is the only system that we
should play
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I agree with both of you champs, @Mriyo, you quite right to say that it was a very bad perfomance by the team and this 4-3-3 did cost us that quarter final against Celtic as it seemed that we were unable to defend properly and we played much better in the ensiung games when we reverted to our tried and tested 4-4-2 formation. But I also do agree with @ Vinny that yesterday as soon as Jali went out and Mbuyane we went in, and went back to 4-4-2 things just went loose, we couldn't even get possession and its like we were 10men down not them and immediately when Okonkwo was on, went back to 4-3-3, we gained better control of that midfield and finally closed out the game. So I actually think that sometimes its good not to be one dimensional in formations especially since we don't have a good mobile striker to support Benni/Mbesuma/Chinyama in order for us to operate an effective 4-4-2.