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| Gavin Hunt © Backpagepix |
SuperSport United coach Gavin Hunt was ready to hit the ceiling after his SuperSport United team seemed to go walk-about and almost surrendered two points in their 3-2 Premier League victory over Maritzburg United at a rain-soaked, almost deserted Loftus Stadium in Pretoria on Saturday afternoon.
Persistent rain over 24 hours before the kick-off had ceased,
but the game was still a dampener for the coach of the defending
champions and log leaders and he described SuperSport's
performances as "haphazard and unucceptable" after they had led 2-0
and 3-1 and seemed to have the three points all sewn up.
But Hunt himself might not have been blameless for the fade-out,
with second-half substitutions doing nothing to enhance
SuperSport's performance after the champions had led 1-0 at the
interval through a snap goal from Jabulani Maluleke in the 45th
minute.
SuperSport appeared to take control of the proceedings when a
scorching shot on the run from Liberian international Anthony
Laffor gave them a 2-0 lead in the 54th minute, but instead the
goal seemed to herald a growing deterioration in the team's
performance.
And Maritzburg substitute Brice Aka took advantage of
lackadaisical SuperSport defending to reduce the deficit in the
70th minute and insert fresh life into the struggling KwaZulu-Natal
combination who were playing under the tutelage of former Kaizer
Chiefs coach Ernst Middendorp for the first time following the
sudden departure of Gordon Igesund.
Laffor, constantly in the thick of the action, took advantage of
Maritzburg's leaky defence to score his second goal in the 72nd
minute and seemingly consolidate SuperSport's advantage at the top
of the log.
But Maritzburg refused to go down without a fight and Rudolph
Bester, who was thwarted from scoring in the first half by a
sensational save from SuperSport goalkeeper Emille Baron, recorded
a well-deserved goal in the 81st minute to keep the outcome in the
balance until the final whistle.
"With this kind of fighting spirit," German-born Maritzburg
coach Middendorp said afterwards, "I'm confident we can turn the
corner and move into a respectable position in the log table."
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