Cape Town – Stellies coach Steve Barker is the longest serving coach in the South African top flight, having been in charge of his club since 2017. In that time, the club has experienced many highs and lows and it was their handling of their lows that has been impressive.
Had Barker been in charge of most other South African top-flight clubs, there is no doubt that he would have long been sacked. Stellies were a surprise package of last season as they finished fourth in the league and were in contention for a place in the CAF Champions League which they missed out on by just two points.
They made significant improvement as compared to the 2020-21 season as they finished 14th in that campaign and finished just two points clear of Chippa United who contested the promotion/relegation play-offs at the end of that campaign.
The star of the show last season for Stellies was Ashley Du Preez who netted nine league goals to earn himself a move to Kaizer Chiefs. Zitha Kwinika also went to Chiefs following resolute performances in the heart of defence for the Western Cape-based side last term.
The chances are high that Stellies’ performances would have been better so far this season had Kwinika and Du Preez stayed but instead of wallowing in self-pity, they have moved on with the absence of the duo not being overly obvious this season to them.
Stellies are unbeaten in the league after three games with their most recent result being a 3-1 win over Royal AM. The win against Royal AM was especially impressive as they only had 35% ball possession but still managed to outwit their opponent with smarter tactics which maximised what they could achieve when they found themselves in possession. Stellies have a worrying injury list which has led them towards having to deploy DSTV Diski Challenge player Oswin Andries who is naturally a midfielder in defence.
After the game, Royal AM coach Dan Malesela issued an honest assessment to what transpired, more or less conceding that his side were outsmarted in the game even though they had the ammunition to get a victory.
“I don’t want to attribute this to anything because it will take away from what Stellenbosch did. We exposed ourselves at the club. We were really flat but need to fix things. We have to look at the team and how we play. Sometimes we need a wake-up call from what happened. We learnt a lot of lessons from this,” Malesela said.
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