Chiefs coach Stuart Baxter. Photo: Twitter @KaizerChiefs
Livid Chiefs coach: ‘I can’t swear, can I?’
Coach Stuart Baxter has suggested Kaizer Chiefs were so ‘bad’ against AmaZulu that they were lucky to not lose by three or four goals.
Chiefs coach Stuart Baxter. Photo: Twitter @KaizerChiefs
Despite being held to a 1-1 draw with Benni McCarthy’s AmaZulu on Wednesday, Kaizer Chiefs moved up the latest DStv Premiership standings to fifth spot, but it was not a match that inspired confidence or compliments from either coach.
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The Glamour Boys ‘scored’ the opening goal of the match in the 20th minute thanks to an own goal by Keagan Buchanan, but were then reduced to 10 men when Cole Alexander was shown a red card for a second bookable offence in the 60th minute.
AmaZulu took advantage of their numerical superiority to draw level in the 77th minute thanks to a goal from Bongi Ntuli, but coach Benni McCarthy was far from impressed with his team’s performance
“When you understand football and work with these guys every day, but then see what they give you on match day, how can I be happy and satisfied with getting a point from a game we should be winning?’ he ranted afterwards.
“God help us when it comes to next season,” McCarthy added, while admitting he had been caught for the interview at a time when he was extremely frustrated and disappointed.
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Ironically, Baxter suggested he would have also been livid if he was McCarthy.
“If I was Benni, I would be going mental that they didn’t put us to the sword by three or four goals because I thought we were that bad.”
Chiefs coach laments poor decision-making
However, Baxter also didn’t hold back in the assessment of his own charges.
“This is on prime-time television, so I can’t swear, can I?” the Chiefs coach quipped. “I thought it was poor game. I thought we were good for about 15-20 minutes. And then for some reason we switched off.
“We had good control of the game but AmaZulu got back into it in the last 15-20 minutes of the first half where they were threatening without being really dangerous.
“And then second half we wanted to be braver, we wanted to get on the ball more. But that just led to us losing structure completely. And the red card put us up against the wall and we concede what is a very poor goal. But through the whole of the second half the decision-making on our side was very, very poor.”
Chiefs are next in action in a Soweto Derby against Swallows FC on Sunday.
