Newly appointed Cape Town Spurs head coach Ernst Middendorp says he is used to facing difficult tasks in his previous jobs with Kaizer Chiefs or Maritzburg United.
Spurs unveiled Middendorp on Friday afternoon at iKamva, with Middendorp believed to have signed a two-year deal with the club.
The German mentor joined a Spurs side that is sitting deep in relegation zone and has been given a task to save the club from going down.
Middendorp is no unknown name in South African football and has faced many difficult tasks during his more than 30 years of coaching, but he didn’t want to compare his current taks with previous jobs.
“If you work with a team, which finished position nine and they believe they should be champions and you have only one year time to make it happen, obviously you have to compete for the championship, it’s a very difficult task,” Middendorp said during his unveiling.
“You work in the second Bundesliga, two teams are fighting to be promoted to the Bundesliga, and every Monday morning you not in position one or two you get told ‘position three, four, five is a relegation position’.
“You go into a team in KwaZulu-Natal in November, where you have one point after 11 games, you must make it happen, you have to win so many points to stay in the league at the end of the day…
“It’s all different situations, you cannot compare one with the other one, this is a difficult task there’s no doubt about it and let’s leave it like this.”
Middendorp also insisted that his work with the team only starts now, as he will begin to assess his new squad and players.
“Now it’s about really to use every minute to find first what’s the assessment, what can be the impression from my side, from all of us,” he added.
“And then to look into how and what’s important. There are areas of improvement, where you believe or everybody should stick to it, to say ‘ok, in these areas’, for example critical phases, for example defensively, number of goals you concede should not happen, and, and, and… using the chances at the end of the game with a penalty, shoot it not to the crossbar, shoot it into the net.
“You really have to produce a certain energy with the players, and that’s what we have to do.”
