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Why SuperSport's 4-0 win over Black Leopards did not impress McCarthy

Cape Town City FC head coach Benni McCarthy shares a funny moment with his players during a training session and media day at Hartleyvale, Cape Town on August 1 2018.
Cape Town City FC head coach Benni McCarthy shares a funny moment with his players during a training session and media day at Hartleyvale, Cape Town on August 1 2018.
Image: Chris Ricco/BackpagePix

Benni McCarthy says SuperSport United’s 4-0 win over Black Leopards did not impress him and called “it a smokescreen result” as the hype ahead of Saturday’s MTN8 final began.

Cape Town City coach McCarthy watched Sunday’s game at Atteridgeville on television as SuperSport warmed up for the final with a confidence-boosting victory over Leopards.

But he is refusing to read anything into it.

“That’s a smoke screen game.

"I’m not taking much from that‚ the fact that they scored a lot of goals‚” he said on Tuesday.

Instead McCarthy says he and his technical staff have studied their past games against SuperSport since he took over at the Cape Town club‚ including last year’s MTN8 final.

“That’s the best definition to take if we want to learn how to play against them‚" he said.

"We’ve played them four times and if you analyse the four games‚ they have featured more or less the same personnel in all four games that they’ve played against us.

"Ninety percent of their team hasn’t changed against us – maybe‚ two or three new players here and there.

"(Onismor) Bhasera played against us for the first time when we beat them at the start of the season but (Teboho) Mokoena didn’t play.

"Bongani Khumalo hasn’t played against us yet‚ it was always Morgan Gould and Clayton Daniels against us.

“So I think the best way for us to analyse them is to watch the games we’ve played against them‚ where we’ve done exceptionally well.

"They have the same patterns‚ which we’ve studied‚ and we’ve gone and looked at our weakness – the things where we didn’t go well against them and where they might have hurt us in some instances - and are working on them.”

Last season‚ three meetings between the two clubs were drawn including the MTN8 final in Durban which SuperSport then took on post-match penalties.

City beat SuperSport United 2-0 in Cape Town on the opening weekend of the new league campaign.

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