Mamelodi Sundowns head coach Miguel Cardoso has suggested Orlando Pirates’ recent transfers has elevated their chances of sustaining a genuine title challenge this season.
After the 1-1 draw – which leaves Sundowns at the summit, three points ahead of Pirates, albeit having played two games more, Cardoso admits it’s a side that have significantly increased in depth to challenge over the course of the 2025/26 season.
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Abdeslam Ouaddou, who arrived in the off-season as the successor to Jose Riveiro, who finished his three seasons as runners-up in the league and won five domestic cups, as well as reaching the CAF Champions League semi-final – took over a side with 14 new signings and 16 exits.
Five of the new signings; Sihle Nduli, Masindi Nemtajela, Lebone Seema, Tshepang Moremi and Oswin Appollis earned starts at Loftus Versfeld, while 20-year-old Camren Dansin lined-up in midfield in a surprise selection, as they drew 1-1 with the reigning league champions who are chasing a ninth straight first place finish.
“I’m not saying – what they did [in the market] was balance much more their team compared to what they had in the past,” Cardoso said when asked by iDiski Times to elaborate on his suggestion that Pirates have major depth to challenge this season.
“Now they can change players and keep a lot of pressure on the opposition, with the quality they bring from the bench… Guys, I’ve been here from one year, so I don’t know but from what I heard before is that they brought many quality inside the team.
“I asked my head analyst, assistant coach to make a list of all the players in the squad – of course I know them well but when you see that players that were so important for them last year, this season, they don’t even put the shirt on…
“You then understand how strong the team is compared to the past – because there’s a lot of players who don’t even put the shirt on and I started from the striker [Mabasa], Mbatha doesn’t play, Van Rooyen – I can state many more.
“Even Rele, the second-best player last season, wasn’t playing, so I’m not saying they are better or worse because that doesn’t exist – you need to prove it every day, but according to the availability of players, I’m sure Ouaddou wanted Mofokeng on the bench and Sebelebele.
“If they were not on the bench, it’s because they are not available – his team today was not so strong, I told my guys, if we score first, they will not have weapons to score twice, if we took it to the last stages, it won’t be what happened in the cup.
“They wouldn’t have energy to bring on that could threaten us – and you saw how they tried to aggress us with Tito and Mbule – players who can’t go into the spaces like Mofokeng or Sebelebele as a winger could.
“So Ouaddou didn’t have the weapons to make something more powerful, if he had the bench he would have wanted, he could have made more danger against us than he did.”
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