Johannesburg - Travis Graham is hoping to lead Ajax Cape Town to glory in Saturday's MTN8 final against Kaizer Chiefs in Port Elizabeth.
Having joined the club as a 10-year-old, Graham hopes he can write his name into the Urban Warriors' history books by helping inspire his team to the trophy.
After making his debut as a 19-year-old in 2012/ 2013, Graham went on to play 14 matches that season, but was unable to kick on in the following campaign as injuries curtailed his game time to only 200 minutes for the entire 2013/ 2014 season.
Last season, he was named club captain by Roger De Sa in August 2014, going on to play in 34 matches. In the process, he helped the club achieve its first top eight finish in five years while also reaching the final of the Nedbank Cup.
A model professional, his winning mentality, tenacity and drive from the middle of the park, has made the Ottery-born player a perfect fit for the captain's armband.
The club's youngest ever captain an exemplary example of Ajax's proud youth academy system.
“Captaincy is for certain players, because you have to lead the team, motivate them and lead from the front - it can put a lot of pressure on one's own game,” Graham was quoted as saying a few months into his reign as skipper.
“I think I'm more of a natural leader, I've worked on it through the years in the development and I was made for it.”
For De Sa, it was an obvious choice: “I could see his qualities, his character and his temperament, and I think he could be captain of the club for many years to come. He's got that kind of attitude. He carries himself well, he does all the work,” he said.
The combination of coach De Sa and captain Graham has been a major factor in the Cape side's renewal of fortunes over the last 12 months, and going into the final Ajax find themselves top of the Absa Premiership standings having continued the momentum they begun to pick up last season.
Graham still sees Urban Warriors as underdogs against a Chiefs side which has won the top eight competition 15 times, but is determined to put to rest the memories of earlier this year, when Ajax went down to Mamelodi Sundowns in the Nedbank Cup final.
“It's going to be a difficult one,” he told PSL.co.za. “Chiefs are one of the greatest sides in South African history. It's going to challenging for us. We're obviously the underdogs and have got a lot to prove.
“Losing in the last final [the 2015 Nedbank Cup] and feeling what it was like to lose, it wasn't a good feeling. So this time around we want to be on the other side. Hopefully we can win it for the fans, for the club, and for our own careers. It would be just wonderful for us as individuals.”
Rather than looking at the team's previous final as a failure, Graham is hoping that the experience gained by a largely young Ajax team could help to overcome Steve Komphela's in-form Chiefs side.
“We are going to have to put aside last year's final. Its done and dusted, we can't do anything about it. We can just focus on the next game, take each game at a time as usual. The last final we didn't know what to expect, so everyone was a bit nervous.
“We need to try and capitilise and take our chances as early as possible. You don't get many chances against Chiefs, its important for us to try and take the first chances that come our way.” - African News Agency (ANA).