Pienaar to start in Challenge final
Bafana Bafana and Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Steven Pienaar will start for the first time in the Vodacom Challenge against Orlando Pirates in the tournament final at Ellis Park Stadium on Saturday afternoon.
This was assured by the English club's coach Harry Redknapp, who said that he wanted the South African national captain to start in the first eleven of their final match before returning to the UK.
Pienaar sat out Spurs's two earlier matches against Kaizer Chiefs and Pirates on their South African tour with a knee injury.
On Friday, he took part in a full training session with the rest of his teammates, and looked ready to return to full action with regular club captain Ledley King -- also out with a recent knee injury -- watching on the sidelines.
"I'm happy that Steven is training and looking to give him a start against Pirates," said Redknapp.
"I'm hoping that he at least gets 45 minutes of action on Saturday.
"It's his home country, and he has been looking forward to playing." Spurs will board for London soon after the match with Redknapp satisfied with the week his side has spent in the country.
"The preparations have been fantastic, and we have had some tough games here," he said.
"I have been very impressed and the football has been of the highest standard."
"But we haven't seen the best from Spurs yet, its still pre-season. Last year we played in the Uefa Champions League and we as a team are not at that level yet that's for sure."
The happiest person from the tournament has be Orlando Pirates coach Julio Leal, whose side has responded well to his philosophy in his first two matches in charge.
Taking over from a treble-winning Ruud Krol and having to win the hard to please Buccaneers faithful was never going to be an easy task for the Brazilian.
Though, after beating arch-rivals Chiefs 1-0 in Port Elizabeth on Thursday through a Tlou Segolela second-half goal in a match they had to win to be in the final, Leal will warm more hearts and trust if his team beats Spurs to lift the trophy.
"I'm very happy with the performance and we used the opportunity well to increase experience, exposure and confidence for our players," Leal said.
"The positive is the response I got from my players in a short period of time because I gave them more freedom of expression.
"There aren't that many negatives as yet even though I felt I needed to talk to the players at half-time against Chiefs because we were not at our best in the first-half."
While Leal has given new recruits like Siyabonga Sangweni and Sameehg Doutie some game time, he said he was unlikely to field old warhorses in Lucas Thwala, regular captain Benson Mhlongo and Moeneeb Josephs in the final.
The trio has recovered from long-term injuries and will be slowly re-introduced back to competitive football before the 2011/12 campaign begins.
"As it's a competition, we wanted to be in the final and I did not want to play them since they have been out for some time," said Leal.
"They play a strong leadership in the squad and want them to compete in some friendly matches before we begin the season."
As of Friday, 6 000 tickets were still available for the 55 000 seater venue with the game kicking off at 3pm.