Orlando Pirates head coach Jose Riveiro has expressed his emotions about his time at the club and how the fans have always treated him saying it has changed him.
Riveiro is on his way out of the club at the end of the season following confirmation by the club that he was not going to renew his contract.
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The Spaniard has won five domestic cups in his two-and-a-half year stay at the club and this campaign the side is still in with a mathematical shot in the league title race, the Nedbank Cup and on Wednesday evening qualified for the CAF Champions League semi-finals.
Fans chanted the coach’s name at full time of the quarter-final 2nd leg clash win over MC Alger and Riveiro got a bit emotional talking about what the fans’ treatment of him meant.
“You want me to get emotional now? No way,” said Riveiro.
“No, my life will never be the same after being here as a Pirates coach. What else can I tell you? It’s a big change in my life. I’m not talking about football.
“I’m talking about all of those things that you say in the way that the people are expressing themselves towards me. It’s something special.”
Riveiro added that he knows how important the game is it to fans and will try hard to get Pirates to the end in all the competitions they are in.
“The sacrifices is my job,” added the 49-year-old.
“I’m here for that reason. I’m here with that mandate. We’re here to try to do everything in order to put the club in the space that the club like Pirates itself and the space that the fans want us to be.
“Trust me we know how important football is for them. We’re talking about something else than winning one game or not. We’re talking about a lot of things as a society.
“I’m really conscious about that and I know it every day. Every day when we wake up in the morning, we go to training, we know what we are playing for and to who, and again still I think seven or eight weeks together here.
“Hopefully we can go till the last stages of every competition.
“For sure they are going to be special but trust me, almost since I arrived here, if we speak about the fans, not about you, they were always really friendly and kind and special with the coach.
“Like I said, for me and I said everywhere I go, that my life will never be the same after being Pirates coach, because this is not just one more club. It’s a very special one.”
