Gutted Riveiro struggles to describe Pirates loss

Orlando Pirates are out of the CAF Champions League and gutted coach Jose Riveiro struggles to describe the loss to Jwaneng Galaxy.

Riveiro promised Pirates fans a special night as they looked to beat Galaxy on Friday night, but his men succumbed to a disappointing loss.

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The former African champions were stunned by their Botswana counterparts via a 5-4 margin on penalties.

Pirates headed to the second-leg preliminary encounter trailing Galaxy by 1-0 from the first leg match and Riveiro said it was difficult to explain the defeat.

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GUTTED PIRATES RIVEIRO STRUGGLES TO DESCRIBE LOSS

The reigning MTN8 and Nedbank Cup champions struggled to overturn their first-leg defeat as they clashed against Morena Ramoreboli’s Jwaneng.

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While Galaxy converted all their spot-kicks after a 1-0 win for Pirates, youngster Relobohile Mofokeng missed for the South Africans thus ending their hopes of reaching the group stages.

In his post-match conference and address to the media, Riveiro was visibly disappointed and could not find words to explain their display.

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“There’s not much to decode here about the game, it’s a difficult game to explain from the scoring perspective, the guys’ performance tonight was more than enough to drive us to the group stages,” Riveiro said per iDiski Times.

“But for reasons that are still difficult to explain at this moment straight after the game, we couldn’t make it in the 90 minutes and then in the penalties, everything can happen. It’s part of the game, something we need to do better and dominate.

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“We couldn’t. We started with a 1-0 disadvantage but I think, I don’t know… it’s difficult to explain how we scored one goal in for games and the way we did it today was an ugly goal.”

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As they will turn their focus to a sold-out MTN8 final against in-form Mamelodi Sundowns next weekend, Riveiro will need to cheer up his men.

Pirates have gone four matches without a win and have failed to score in three of those games before netting against Galaxy on Friday night.

“A difficult day, not acceptable, this team is built and prepared to go to the Champions League group stage, so we can’t accept this result and say we’re unlucky, nobody feels proud of the result and that the fact we’re not going to the group stages,” he added.

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“We have to accept it, analyse it, and take responsibility [for it], the coach more than anybody else and we need to do a proper reflection about our participation in this competition because obviously, it wasn’t good enough.”

Meanwhile, Mzansi will now turn focus to Sundowns who are the only Champions League representatives who are in action on Saturday evening.

They are on the verge of reaching the group stages as they lead Bumamuru 4-0 from the opening leg in Tanzania.

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