COLLECTING full points for Mamelodi Sundowns against Marumo Gallants is like leaving a foot on the neck of Orlando Pirates who won the Betway Premiership title before going to finish the job in the Caf Champions League on Sunday in Bamako, Mali.
Sundowns returned to the top of the log with a victory over Gallants with two goals from Teboho Mokoena and Keanu Cupido on Tuesday night at Loftus Versfeld Stadium, Pretoria.
The home scorer for Gallants was scored by former Pirates player, Ndabayithethwa Ndlondlo, it was a penalty.
Sundowns’ victory left Pirates with the burden of winning on Saturday when they face TS Galaxy in an attempt to return to the top.
Sundowns will head to the second leg of the Champions League quarter-final on Sunday with Stade Malien leading the way with 50 points.
Pirates are second with 48 matches, equal to Sundowns (21).
Although it was fortunate that Gallants came back into the game with a penalty at the end of the first half, Sundowns let themselves down by giving up easy chances in this game.
It is also important to highlight the contributions of Washington Arubi, who beat Bryan Leon many times until the last minutes of the first half, and was finally selected as the best player of the day. It’s almost the end, Nuno Santos caught the ball with his hand in the box, the referee pointed to the penalty.
It was taken by Ndlondlo and he put it in the net which led to the break being 1-1.
The second half started with Sundowns bringing on Mokoena followed by Monnapule Saleng and Iqraam Rayners.
It was these changes that changed things for Sundowns and that’s where Mokoena’s goals came to bring them back to the top in the middle of the second half and at the end of it.
There were some good moves from the Gallants in the final minutes but it ended up not helping them.