St Eloi Lupopo midfielder Dramane Kambou says they were never distracted by the Orlando Pirates protest and states Mamelodi Sundowns will be welcomed professionally in DR Congo for their away trip.
The Burkina Faso midfielder played the full 90 minutes in their Group C opener at Loftus Versfeld where Sundowns eased to a 3-1 victory against the Linafoot side – who had eliminated last season’s semi-finalists in the second preliminary round of the competition.
Up until their arrival in South Africa, there were question marks over whether Pirates would be reinstated into the competition over administrative issues on two players registrations being question, as well as the eligibility of head coach Guy Bukasa to be on the bench.
They were eventually cleared by the Disciplinary Committee of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) over players in question while Bukasa was fined, due to him serving a ban, that was carried over from the U20 Africa Cup of Nations where he led DR Congo.
“No [we were never distracted] as players we were fully focused [on Sundowns], that was administrative issues and it’s not our jobs as players to focus on, so we were focused on the game, the admin is not what we should worry about,” Kambou said.
“As a player, we just have to get the job done on the pitch, and the protest was for administrators, it didn’t change anything in our morale or focus of our game against Sundowns.”
He went on to state that what was said on social media of ill treatment was not the case and Sundowns will receive a warm welcome in Congo; “They will be welcomed in DRC as Pirates were, we are a professional team, everything that was said on social media is not true, we will do our best as a team and our administration will do our best to really welcome Sundowns, as they did for us here.”
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