After back-to-back defeats against Marumo Gallants in the Betway Premiership, KickOff.com analyses how a foundation laid by Abdeslam Ouaddou at Gallants came back to haunt him.
Pirates not only lost two successive league matches but lost to Siwelele Sa Marumo twice on the bounce in the Premiership, after a 2-0 defeat at the hands of Ouaddou back in March, while the Soweto giants were under Jose Riveiro.
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The stats show that wisdom is not only reserved for the aged, as 28-year-old coach Alexandre Lafitte has kept the core of the Gallants team that impressed under the Moroccan coach's short stint.
From Gallants' 2-0 win over Pirates last season, Lafitte managed to retain six players who were in the line-up under Ouaddou while The Buccaneers from that fixture only retained goalkeeper Sipho Chaine and Deon Hotto with the same coach moving in the opposite direction in the new campaign.
After Ezimnyama had 18 shots at goal, with seven on target in their 2-1 loss to the same side on Tuesday, there are questions marks on whether The Ghosts did enough not to lose.
Comparing with the same match last season, Pirates stats dropped, even though they lost 2-0 under Riveiro, as a 61 percent ball possession under the Moroccan mentor shows a slight departure from the Spanish coach's model, as The Bucs had a 72 percent of ball possession back in March of this clash.
Of course ball possesses does not necessarily decide games, as the Bucs lost back then, even though they dominated the stats but it appears there has not been any improvement in the urgency and decisiveness in front of goal, as the Soweto giants had an xG (expected goals) of 1.56 under Ouaddou, lower than under Riveiro in his 2-0 defeat, where they had an xG of 1.81.
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Perhaps Pirates did enough to win the game against Marumo in March, as they had a total of ten corners back then, but on Tuesday, that stat also dropped, as Ouaddou's charges had only five corner-kicks the whole game.
In a 2-0 defeat to Gallants last term, The Buccaneers had 467 completed passes under Riveiro but they didn't hold the ball as much on Tuesday, as they completed only 400 passes, with lack of cohesion perhaps explained by nine changes in comparison to when Riveiro named his line-up against the same side the last time they met in the league.
