Gavin Lane explains Orlando Pirates inconsistency

Immediately after winning the Soweto Derby that took place last weekend, Pirates could not close the gap between themselves and log leaders Mamelodi Sundowns after losing 2-0 to Golden Arrows.

'Stability Unit' believes the Buccaneers' inconsistency in the last few months could be due to playing too many games in a short space of time.

"Football nowadays is crazy if you look in every league, they are playing so many games in such a short space of time," Lane tells snl24.com/kickoff.

"You know the coaches are having a hard time, they keep on changing the players because the legs are tired and there's no training because of this difficult experience everyone is going through.

"You can see one week they are playing well, the second week they look a little bit tired. And then the next week they come out and they look good. So there's a lot of different elements. It's difficult to say why Pirates beat Chiefs and three days later they lose again."

Scroll right to see Motale's Dream Team (4-4-2)

GK - Williams Okpara - I loved his work-rate and reflexes. He is someone who would die for us, do you get me? Okpara was the best my brother... ja he's a 150 percent.

RB - Oupa Mabuza (bottom left) - He was very clean but he was a defender. When he went for a tackle you wouldn't feel this tackle. He was able to judge it very well.

LB - Edward Motale - At left-back obviously it's going to be me. I played with the next two centre-backs and our combination and communication was the best.

CB - Dan Malesela - Hard at the back but he was more of a ball-player. He could play a bit, he could tackle, he could defend, and he could attack.

CB - Gavin Lane - Both him and Malesela were hard but Lane was just a natural sweeper, he could think quick. He was never scared.

CM - John Moeti - Disciplined in the anchor role, John who would finish a game without saying anything, even one word. He'd just do his job and let the others also do their job.

CM - Isaac Kungwane - Shakes had skill and could do things to make it happen. He was very skilful, good passer and could score goals, so at least he would relieve John's stress.

RM - Joel Faya - Just like Helman Mkhalele, he had pace and delivered good crosses, a quality cross and not just any other cross for that matter.

LM - Helman Mkhalele - Good crosser of the ball and he was lightning. When he was gone, he was gone... forget it!

ST - Les Grobler - Les could hold the ball and aerially he was good. His free-kicks were also good.

ST - Jerry Sikhosana - Jerry was more mobile than Les. He collected the ball and put it inside the box or passed to Grobler and they hit the net.

The former defender says he does not remember losing their next game immediately after winning the Soweto Derby during his days at Pirates.

"That was so long ago I can't even remember," Lane says. "It could have happened, I can't remember. I just remember beating Chiefs quite a lot of times, which was always good. I can't remember the next game if we won or lost. It was long time ago.

"But obviously we weren't in difficult times like right now, the guys play on a Saturday and then you have to play again on a Tuesday, so every third day or fourth day you've got to play a match.

"These days a coach can't even go to training and say to a player 'this is why you made a mistake' because you can't even train players. At the moment players must just go for massages, have a little run around, go to the gym maybe to just do a cycle, because you don't want to exhaust your players."

Related tags