In their maiden Absa Premiership campaign, the Citizens secured an impressive third-place finish, despite a disappointing 4-2 loss on the final day of the season against Polokwane City.
Third place does, however, confirm the club’s participation in next year’s CAF Confederation Cup, a tournament which Tinkler is looking forward to.
"You know if you finish third, that's where you go, the Confederation Cup,” he said. “You obviously have to reassess the squad come the end of the season, although we have already started doing that.
“You are always looking to strengthen the squad and get depth, but for us to achieve that in our first season is fantastic, and giving guys the opportunity of experiencing what CAF competitions are all about, what it is like to travel in Africa … the more players that experience that, the better, obviously, for the national team.”
The costs of travelling on the continent are not cheap, yet Tinkler says he’s already had talks with club owner John Comitis about giving the tournament a full go, highlighting the efforts of some of the most remote countries in Africa in their CAF exploits.
“John [Comitis] himself wants us to get there and he knows it is obviously going to be very important for us to look for sponsorships to aid because we know all the costs that goes into going into CAF, but I think now also I believe that the PSL helps to a certain degree with the funding so I think that takes a little bit of weight off the clubs,” Tinkler said.
“But I think sponsorships are needed in our game to ensure teams do go there – if you’ve got teams from Mali and Gabon and the ends of the earth that financially don’t have what we have in our country, you have to be questioning why it is that we can’t go, so we’ll find a way.”