Johannesburg - Fabian McCarthy would love the opportunity to address the Mamelodi Sundowns players ahead of their Caf Champions League final, first leg clash with Zamalek on Saturday.
In his talk, the former Brazilians defender will stress the importance of keeping a clean sheet for Pitso Mosimane’s team.
“That’s what killed us back in 2001,” McCarthy reminisced of Sundowns’ 4-1 aggregate defeat by Al Ahly 15 years ago, a result brought about by their letting the Red Devils get the away goal “We lost that final when we played 1-1 at home.
McCarthy, now retired and a television analyst of the game who is also actively involved in development, remembers that they knew just what it was they had to do but somehow they couldn’t.
“The instruction from the late Ted (Dumitru) was that we don’t concede. And we had a good solid team with experience to do that. And I remember telling the strikers that if they score, as a defender I would double up my effort to stop the man I’m marking.”
The strikers did score, Gift Kampamba putting Sundowns ahead.
“It was a great feeling to go into the lead, but we knew one goal was not enough. So we put the likes of Roger (Feutmba), Charles (Motlohi) and Bennett (Mnguni) under pressure to create more chances for Mambush (Daniel Mudau) and Carlo (Scott) to score.”
They didn’t but at least the defence held sway until the break: “It was good to keep a clean sheet and at half time Ted allowed us a few minutes of rest so we could get our breath back as he always did. He didn’t say too much, he just told us to keep our lead and try go for another goal. But then we allowed Ahly to score.”
The equaliser deflated Sundowns who knew just how hard it was going to be to get a result in Cairo.
A 3-0 hammering in Cairo followed and Sundowns’ chance at continental glory was gone.
McCarthy would love nothing more than to see this current crop get a better value medal than he did.
“I am happy to have a silver medal but I think this team deserves better. I believe they have the beating of Zamalek as they showed in the group stage. But to do that they need to make sure they don’t concede on Saturday and they must score at least three goals. The good thing is that they have shown they can score away from home, so if they just defend well I am sure they can go on to make the country very proud.”
The Star