Mamelodi Sundowns coach Miguel Cardoso has detailed his plan to get Bafana Bafana stars Themba Zwane and Mothobi Mvala ready for competitive football. The duo has been sidelined due to injuries.
As the CAF Champions League enters the quarterfinal stage, Cardoso has laid out how the two will be prepared for action. Mvala last featured for Masandawana in December against AS FAR Rabat in the Champions League.
Zwane, on the other hand, has been sidelined by an Achilles injury since October last year. Sundowns take on Esperance on Tuesday afternoon at the Loftus Versveld Stadium in Pretoria. It’s the first-leg quarterfinal encounter, with the return leg set for Tunis a week from now.
The Tshwane giants players, including Mvala and Zwane, were engaged in training on Monday morning, gearing up for their highly anticipated match against Esperance.
HOW SUNDOWNS WILL GET MVALA AND ZWANE READY FOR ACTION
“Regarding the players that are still out of the group, Themba is almost there. But, he’s still not in a condition to participate in this match and not even in the second one,” explained Cardoso.
“But also Mothobi [Mvala] and [Lebo] Mothiba. Indeed, we feel that they are quite close. We feel that they are quite close, for you to be clear. We are now in the moment where they have already trained 100% with the group, with the exception of Mothiba, Rivaldo [Coetzee], and young [Siyabonga] Mabena.”
The Portuguese mentor further said Zwane and Mvala “are training with the group”. “Now we’re going to prepare to give them a stimulus of the game, not official games, because they should not participate in an official game before they have had the chance to play in a friendly.”
He went on to explain the process of getting them ready for competitive action. “During this period of time that we’re going to play Esperance, there are two competition moments that they will be submitted to.
Tomorrow [Tuesday], they will make in the morning a situation in full pitch with some players from the [DStv] Diski [Challenge] team. And then when we fly to Tunisia, there will be a friendly match where they are going to play against a team, and we will invite them to come to play with us.”
Should the Brazilians proceed to the semifinal of the Champions League, the two are likely to feature.
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