Notwithstanding their title miss, the South African tactician assured that the Red Devils will ‘come back stronger’
Coach Pitso Mosimane has opened up on why Al Ahly failed to win the 2020-21 Egyptian Premier League diadem.
The Red Devils’ title aspirations got dashed on Tuesday night as they settled for a 3-3 draw with El Gouna, leaving rivals Zamalek to claim the title with a 2-0 triumph over El-Entag El-Harby.
A league success could have helped the Cairo International Stadium giants earn a double following their achievement in the 2021 Caf Champions League – defeating Kaizer Chiefs 3-0 in the final staged inside Stade Mohammed V, Casablanca.
Addressing media after taking on Reda Shehata’s Gounies, the former Mamelodi Sundowns and Supersport United handler opened up on why his team fell short of winning a 43rd top-flight title, while declaring that Al Ahly would return stronger.
“Al Ahly is a great team. We will turn the page and come back stronger,” Mosimane told Al Ahly website.
“We suffered a lot from fatigue during the previous period as we kept playing for 10 consecutive months.
“We won the bronze medal of the Fifa Club World Cup, the Caf Super Cup title, and two Caf Champions League titles. We are human beings and it is normal to suffer from fatigue.”
“We conceded many goals during our last games, especially while implementing a man-marking system.
“However, despite committing these mistakes, we put on good performances and achieved great results.”
“We accomplished many achievements in the last 10 months. We might have lost the Egyptian Premier League title, but we managed to achieve great things during the previous period,” he continued.
“We are the biggest supporter of the Egypt national teams. Our players joined the Egypt National team in different competitions, with the most recent one being the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.
“Finally, we have many upcoming challenges. We still have the Egyptian Cup, the Caf Super Cup, and the Egyptian Super Cup and we will fight to win them.”
Al Ahly’s last game of the season comes up against Aswan on Friday evening.
With the North Africans parting ways with Swiss coach Rene Weiler due to organisational reasons, Mosimane was named as a permanent replacement on September 20, 2020.
Source: Goal
