JOHANNESBURG — Orlando Pirates winger Daine Klate has encouraged his teammates to take their CAF Champions League form into the domestic scene starting off with today’s Soweto Derby against Kaizer Chiefs in the MTN8 semi-final first-leg clash.
Kick Off
Pirates have taken control of their fate in the Champions League group stages, but have been rather slow in taking off on the local scene where they have lost to AmaZulu in the League and beaten SuperSport United via a penalty shootout in the quarter-finals of the MTN8.
According to Klate all that they need to do is transform that magical form on the continent to the domestic scene.
Ahead of the crunch tie against their biggest rivals Klate is pushing for a continuation of the superb display they showed last week when dismantling Zamalek 4-1. “Hope we can transfer the spirit that we have in the Champions League into Saturday (today) game (against Chiefs),” said Klate.
“If we take the way we played against Zamalek into Saturday’s game (today) then we should definitely score and get a positive result. See what, the plus is that the camaraderie in the team at this moment is good so this Chiefs game comes at the right time.
“To play Chiefs straight after the good hype in the Zamalek game is a good thing for us. This is the type of game that as a player you always look forward to because the stadium is always full. I hope we get a goal or two to take back to Orlando,” he says adding that he is aware that this first leg might as well turn out to be a close tie.
“This is the first leg so I suppose there is going to be a sense of conservativeness, but I think for us what matters is that we must score some goals,” noted the 28 year-old.
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Questioned on why the Bucs have been able to rise up to difficult challenge in the Champions League Klate says it is all about the mindset.
“The main problem between our domestic form and Champions League is our attitude and mentality. In Africa, we are really going all out for the Champions League and really want win all our games.
“Then when we come back home it is a little bit of a different vibe…however, we have had a chat about it and spoken about it amongst ourselves as players. We need to carry the same mentality that we are having in the Champions League into the domestic scene.
“As players we also working on this and we are up for the challenge and the coaches are working overtime in trying to print it into our minds that we need to have the same mentality and attitude on the domestic scene as in Champions League,” Klate added.
