How Sundowns dominated the league – again
Sundowns made it four on the trot, and it was basically a breeze for the men from Choorklop.
Peter Shalulile has been a key man for Sundowns. Picture: Ryan Wilkisky/BackpagePix.
It came as no surprise when Mamelodi Sundowns clinched the DStv Premiership crown for an unprecedented fourth time in a row on Wednesday night, at the expense of their crosstown foes SuperSport United.
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Sundowns have always been in control of the race for the Premiership, in the end comfortably fending off a late challenge challenge from AmaZulu. We take a look at a few pointers that helped the Brazilians land the title.
Big spending
A fat cheque book has always been Mamelodi Sundowns’ route to success, at least since Patrice Motsepe bought the club and pumped in his billions.
Over the years, Sundowns would not miss an opportunity to lure big stars to Chloorkop, but it is only in the recent years big spending has yielded a lot of success for the Pretoria giants. At the start of the season Downs bought Peter Shalulile, Kermit Erasmus, Aubrey Modiba and Brain Onyango, just to mention a few and these players have gone on to become integral parts of the well-oiled machine.
Squad rotation
Sundowns co-head coach Manqoba Mngqithi said this is the only season where they have been able to involve many players in various competitions, making sure that almost everybody adds a shoulder to help carry the load in the Caf Champions League and in domestic cups. Even though they did not do that well i]on other fronts, Downs always had a strong squad available for selection at any given time in the DStv Premiership.
Coaching acumen
It is always said that a new broom sweeps clean, and this season amplified that for the Brazilians, whose management promoted its assistant coaches Mngqithi and Rulani Mokwena to the hot seat, after Pitso Moismane vacated his position to join Al-Ahly last year. Steve Komphela joined them as the senior coach and the three worked seamlessly and always sang in unison. Not that there was much to clean out at Sundowns as they have been dominating the scene for four years now, but the fact that there was change in the leadership gave the team a breath of fresh air and spurred them on to continue producing results.
Chasing records
For Masandawana, the question was never about their capability to win the league as they have demonstrated that over and over again. Sundowns wanted to break their record of 71 points in the league. They cannot go that far, unfortunately for them, but if they win the three remaining games, they will reach 69 points. Remember that age-old phrase: always aim for the stars so when you fall, you land on high trees? That is exactly what Sundowns did this season to secure their fourth championship on the spin.
Experience
If you have done something and succeeded a couple of times, the next time usually becomes easier. It is that simple. Sundowns players and coaches know how to navigate in this space. It’s almost becoming tradition that Bafana Ba Style will compete for the league every season. Downs have claimed the title six times in the last eight championships and have always finished second when they did not hit gold. That should tell you a lot.
