Distress as AmaZulu fire blanks

AmaZulu coach Franco Martin has sounded stressed about the side’s bluntness upfront, saying it's the first time in his career that his team has failed to score a goal in three consecutive games.

AmaZulu played another goalless draw against Richards Bay, their third in a row since the DStv Premiership kicked off early this month. Martin, who joined Usuthu in the off-season, appears frustrated about the outfit’s lack of goals.

“This is something that never happened in my life as a coach, probably not even two games in a row not converting at all. We need to look for solutions,”  Martin said after their scoreless stalemate against Bay at Moses Mabhida Stadium over the weekend. 

“We need to figure out why we can’t perform well in games like we do during the week at training. It’s not only a matter of players, us as the technical team we need to start changing things. Of course, we are happy that we are not conceding goals, but we can’t be happy about not converting chances.”

The Spaniard refused to chalk up their struggles to a congested fixture programme, having played three games in  two days. “There’s no excuses...the schedule is what it is. Sometimes we will have more time to prepare for the games and some weeks we are going to have less days,” Martin said.

On the other hand, the draw extended Natal Rich Boyz’ winless streak in the league to 18 matches. The side’s coach, Kaitano Tembo, admitted their prolonged winless run in the DStv Premiership had affected them mentally, vowing to help snap their poor record.

“Obviously, if you go that long without winning a game, it hits you mentally. It is our responsibility to now take the club out of that situation and motivate the players. Today’s game [on Saturday against AmaZulu] is a big start for me. You can see players are growing in confidence. I have no doubt that we will come out of this situation,” Tembo said.