Orlando Pirates head coach Jose Riveiro has discussed why he felt comfortable to finish the Soweto Derby with six academy players.
The Buccaneers started the game with Relebohile Mofokeng, who scored the winner on the day, Mohau Nkota and Mbekezeli Mbokazi, while the Spanish coach also brought on Siyabonga Ndlozi, Boitumelo Radiopane and Simphiwe Selepe for his first-team debut in the second half.
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After the match, Riveiro stated that he doesn’t select based on age but based on talent, before explaining why academy players can give something special to the team.
“We are proud of them. It’s about me putting them on the field but it’s because they are showing every week that they want to get the opportunity, they are prepared – you will never be fully prepared until you get the experience,” he said.
“But like I said many, many times, it’s not about the age, it’s about the talent. And it’s about to give them the confidence. If they feel that we trust them, it’s going to give them a very important boost.
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“I said already many times, what you get from the academy players is something that you cannot get from anybody else. They have something special; they used to look at the club in a different way. They spent some time around the team before, first as a ball boy, playing for DDC, coming to our training, little by little absorbing the culture of that team.
“And when they are ready to go, they will give you something special, identity. All of those things that play an important role in football. And I think the club, because like I said many times this is not Riveiro vision, this is Orlando Pirates, is doing a good job in that sense.
“My job as a coach is to give them tools to do the things good, together with the technical stuff, and that’s what we do and when the things are going well like today, you can imagine that the feeling for all of us is something special.”
