Sundowns’ Themba Zwane calls for focus ahead of CAF final

With the Betway Premiership campaign now concluded, Themba Zwane has urged his teammates to focus on the upcoming CAF Champions League final against Pyramids FC.

Zwane part of the Sundowns class of 2016

Zwane, alongside Denis Onyango, remains one of only two active players from the triumphant 2016 squad that lifted the prestigious champions league trophy.

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Thapelo Morena is another player that was part of the team 2016, but didn’t play as he had just joined Masandawana from Bloemfontein Celtic and wasn’t registered. 

The Brazilians will host Pyramids FC in the first leg that will be played at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday afternoon. The decisive return leg is set for 1 June in Cairo where the new champions of African club football will be crowned.

“This is an important period for us and obviously my job is to try and encourage the guys to stay focused on the goal,” Zwane said. 

“We can’t let it slip now. We wanted to be in the final and now that we’re there, we just want to finish the job. We wanted to finish the league first before we focus on the final.

“We started (the season) slow and it was difficult for us because the system changed  and we were trying to adjust as a team. After we adjusted to the system, we started doing well as you can see now that we’re getting goals and scoring early in matches.”

‘It feels great’

Zwane was addressing the media after lifting the 2024-25 domestic league crown at Loftus on Sunday. It was the 35-year-old’s eighth league title in a row to take his overall tally to nine championships since he joined Sundowns in 2011. 

“It feels great because you know us Sundowns, we’re not tired of winning. We just want to keep going and we just want to make history and overall we’re happy as a team,” said Zwane who spent the better part of the season on the treatment table with an Achilles injury. 

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“This one is different because when we started, people doubted us because I think we started slow but we managed to pick up the pace in order to improve ourselves and we’ve been doing well and pushed ourselves as a team and we won the trophy.”