Ahead of Saturday’s DStv Premiership match against Orlando Pirates, Mamelodi Sundowns co head coach Manqoba Mngqithi says the club has emphasised that their focus is on taking care of the process.
The defending champions, who are currently top o the table, have 10 points from their four games thus far.
Mngqithi says they target a specific number of points in each cycle, and it does not matter which opponent they face, their target is hitting those targets.
While he says his squad is made of up players who are not new to pressure, that focus does alleviate anxiety and pressure when they play games with a higher profile.
“What we’ve emphasised as the technical team, and thanks to all the coaches that I work with, and everybody else around, we’ve emphasised on taking care of the process,” Mngqithi told the club’s media department.
“And the process is the number of points that we want to achieve in each cycle. And whoever happens to become an opponent in that space, we focus on that in the space of making sure that we achieve our desired targets, and we’ve got the number of points that we are looking for, and Pirates is that team that must give us the points that can help us to achieve our ultimate target.
“So the issue of anxiety, I think we have tried to kill that by maybe focusing more on the process, and making sure that everybody understands that three points is the same, be it Pirates, be it Baroka, or TS Galaxy, or whatever, let’s just make sure we can get the points that can help us to achieve our ultimate targets.
“And the players have responded very well over a number of games now, we can not start to doubt.
“But yes, of course, a game like Pirates will always have elements of pressure, elements of intrinsic motivation. And that intrinsic motivation is most likely to bring an element of anxiety in it.
“And we always have to control that space. Fortunately, a number of players that we are using are players that are used to the pressure of playing for a team like Sundowns.”