Jose Riveiro has been hailed for the impact he has had at Orlando Pirates in his first season after guiding his side impressively to their second cup final.
Riveiro has led Pirates to success in the MTN8 and is in the Nedbank Cup final where Sekhukhune United will provide the opposition at Loftus on May 27.
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In the league, the 50 points that he has gathered with two games to spare have meant that they have improved on the points gathered last season and look set for a second-place finish as well.
A past player who is familiar with Riveiro from Finland – where the Spaniard spent eight years before a move to South Africa – has given his input.
"If he wins two trophies and finishes second then it will show how much of a good coach he is because he has worked with whatever he found at the club," says retired striker Obinna Okafor.
The Nigerian played for Maritzburg United and Benoni Premier United then spent time playing in Finland at FC KTP before his career was cut short by injury.
"Credit to him for that and he has done well for himself in his first season in the country.
"Whoever brought Riveiro to Pirates did his homework well and saw what he has done in his previous jobs.
"The results show how well he has done and if he can continue, he can achieve massive things at Pirates, though I'm not sure about challenging Sundowns," says Okafor.
Just last week Ryan Botha – who also played in Finland – questioned the rationale behind seeing a 'plumber' in Riveiro when he was appointed.
"I understand why there were doubts about him and was referred to as a plumber because nobody knew about him.
"But then I don't blame those who had things to say about because South Africa is a league that pays good money, and the fans expect to import top coaches and players.
"If the Pirates coach has been at HJK then he is obviously familiar with frequently winning games and trophies and needs to be respected for that.
"Then with FC Inter Turku, he has been with the two most famous clubs in Finland who have budgets to import.
"South Africa is a bigger league than Finland because of the quality of players that they attract and are mostly a steppingstone league into Europe.
"Whatever he has done here is based on the kind of material that he found at Pirates which was able to reach the CAF Confederation Cup last season.
"He has come to a team that has the quality and so I was expecting him to do what he has done which is to better what Fadlu (Davids) and Mandla (Ncikazi) achieved last season.
"The truth is that he wasn't coming to build a team at Pirates because they never have time for that," says Okafor while giving insight into Finnish football.
"When I went to Finland back in 2008, football was still growing and by that time there was room for improvement but what was always obvious was that they had the coaches.
"There wasn't much money at the time in Finland at the time and what I know is that they pay better in South Africa than they do up there.
"When I was there, the biggest team that also paid the best money was HJK Helsinki who always win the league there and get to play in the early stages in Europe all the time.
"While the money and facilities might not be what is found in South Africa, they are professional in the way they handle the little that they have and Jari Litmanen remains their most famous player," says Okafor.
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