Xavier Radio Ug News 24 7
Mamelodi Sundowns coach Miguel Cardoso insists he will not rush attacker Monnapule Saleng, despite the immediate impact the forward made following Sunday’s win over Sekhukhune United.
The Brazilians brushed aside Babina Noko 3-1 at Loftus Versfeld to draw level on points with Betway Premiership leaders Orlando Pirates.
Saleng was influential off the bench in the second half; however, Cardoso cautioned that the January signing is still some distance from full fitness.
“Well, Saleng did well, he is a player that has high quality and outcome on those duals, and he can play outside on the right or left – you know him even better than me,” said Cardoso.
“Fortunately, I just started to work with him very recently because he was injured, but he made a fantastic recovery, and we never wanted to put pressure on his comeback.
“And we still should not because obviously he’s recovered, but he’s still getting conditioning and understanding what we want from him – he can play out [wide] and inside, so don’t get surprised if you see him having different positions on the pitch.
“Today we needed to keep the structure, especially because Mudau – as you saw – was struggling with that ankle, and we could not expose him too much in attack.
“Also, we didn’t want to expose ourselves too much in defence, so we decided to bring him in on the right in a moment when Tashreeq was already lacking energy, and it worked fantastically, of course.
“It worked very well for the team. I still have to review the game, but I just know that was an action of [Saleng] that gave a ball inside and Iqraam [Rayners] scored in also a very beautiful technical execution.”
www.sabcnews.com, https://www.sabcnews.com/sabcnews/miguel-cardoso-hits-the-breaks-on-monnapule-saleng-hype/
