The Sunday Mail
Moffat Mungazi in MUTARE
Cranborne Bullets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
FC Platinum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (1) 1
FC PLATINUM coach Norman Mapeza remained coy about his team’s title ambitions despite his 10-man charges dispatching Cranborne Bullets in yesterday’s Castle Lager Premier Soccer League match at Sakubva.
The champions, now on 31 points after 16 matches, inched to within a point of log leaders Chicken Inn.
Donald Teguru’s fifth-minute goal settled matters on a chilly afternoon in Mutare.
Despite a sluggish start to the season, the platinum miners’ revival is continuing as they have now picked four straight wins without conceding.
“We are not looking much at the log standings and our position. We just need to keep working hard, as our current team is work in progress.
“This team is not the same as the one I had two or three seasons ago, so we are still rebuilding.
“The boys are putting the effort and at the moment it is all about grinding out results, which is what we just did today,” said Mapeza.
“I am more than happy with the result after playing for nearly 30 minutes with one man down.
“I think we looked organised at the back but was disappointed with the way we were conceding set-pieces.
“We could have done much better as such situations can decide the outcome of matches when the opponents capitalise on that.” FC Platinum had a bright start to the match, laying siege on their opponents’ goal and were quickly rewarded when Teguru connected with a Hagiazo Magaya delivery in the penalty box.
A Cranborne Bullets defender mistimed his clearance from Magaya’s cross from the right channel, leaving Teguru to pounce and thrust his team into the lead.
From then on, the visitors kept control of the game and were always quick to both the first and second ball.
Bullets, on the other hand, huffed and puffed but created precious little until the break.
The hosts upped the tempo immediately after the restart, with the nimble-footed Jarrison Selemani spearheading most of their attacks from wide areas.
As Bullets kept probing, Selemani’s hard-and-low cross from the right flashed across Wallace Magalane’s goal but found no takers.
Selemani was back to haunt the FC Platinum defence again shortly after and Kelvin Mangiza was forced to upend him on the edge of the box.
It earned the defender his second bookable offence and subsequent expulsion by referee Pedzisai Chadya.
From the resultant set-piece, Selemani’s delivery was half-cleared and fell kindly to Malvern Mudzuka, whose ferocious drive from range was acrobatically tipped over the bar by an alert Magalane.
Sensing danger, Mapeza replaced Magaya with Lawrence Mhlanga to shore up his defence.
However, the soldiers could not capitalise on their numerical advantage as they kept running out of ideas in front of goal and rarely threatened Magalane.
With the equaliser proving elusive, the hosts succumbed to their fourth consecutive defeat.
They have lost three of those by identical 1-0 margins and are now 15th with 16 points from 17 games.
Nesbert Saruchera was naturally disappointed.
“We were just unfortunate to lose this game. Our performance was good although we did not create much to punish them.
“Everyone on the pitch fought hard although we could not get the result we wanted. I cannot complain much and this is one of those bad days in office.
“We will continue working hard and looking forward to a positive result in our next encounter. We do not want to go back to Division One,” said Saruchera.
“Normally, I do not want to comment on things I do not have control over, but I think they scored from a clear offside position.”
