Sundowns Ladies Lose Kansas Cup Opener

It was baptism by fire for Mamelodi Sundowns Ladies as they lost 3-0 in their first match of the 2024 Kansas Women’s Cup against KC Current at the CPKC stadium on Thursday morning.

Coach Jerry Tshabalala named his strongest possible line-up against the visitors and were able to absorb the fast pace set by the Americans in the opening 20 minutes.

Current could have scored as early as the 11^th minute through Kristen Hamilton but her effort was easy for Sundowns defense to handle. Three minutes later Alexa Spaanstra’s powerful shot took a deflection for a corner which Bayley Feist couldn’t put away.

20 minutes into the match Feist found Vanessa Dibernardo but the latter’s shot went wide. Spaanstra finally broke the deadlock with a beauty from just outside the box to hand Current the lead in the 23^rd minute.

Sundowns could have equalised through Boitumelo Rabale in the 36^th minute but her shot was an easy save for Almuth Schult. Vlatko Andonovski’s chargers, however, maintained pressure that saw Michele Cooper doubling the lead in the 38^th minute.

Three minutes to half-time Cooper assisted Dibernardo for the NWSL side’s third goal. It could have been ugly for the Hollywoodbets Super league defending champions with Hamilton scoring the fourth goal but the referee blew for offside leaving Current with 3-0 lead at the break.

The African champions rung changes at the start of the second half introducing Nthabiseng Majiya for Melinda Kgadiete and Lelona Daweti for Andisiwe Mgcoyi. The changes were almost effective with Majiya getting a chance to pull one back for the visitors but her effort was tame.

Sundowns were guilty of giving away set-pieces in the second half but the home side couldn’t capitalise on that.

Current could have gotten their fourth goal from a well worked team effort in the 70^th minute but were denied by Andile Dlamini. Daweti could have also scored for Banyana ba style in the 76^th minute but her shot was off target.

Current will now face European side Atletico Madrid, who saw off INAC Japan’s Kobe earlier on, in the Cup final while Sundowns meet the Asian side in the dead rubber on Saturday.