Chippa United are planning to achieve what 11 Premier Division clubs have so far failed to do to Swallows FC this season.
The Chilli Boys want to become the first team to beat the high-flying Dube Birds whom they meet in a DStv Premiership encounter at the Dobsonville Stadium on Wednesday (17h00).
Swallows have done incredibly well since gaining automatic promotion from the GladAfrica Championship to the Premier Division. So impressive have been Swallows this season that the unbeaten Birds are second on the Premiership standings with 25 points from 11 matches.
They have accumulated the same number of points as log-leaders Mamelodi Sundowns. They have also won and drawn the same number of matches with both sides having won seven times and recorded four stalemates each.
‘‘Preparations are fine, what is key is how we manage the players in terms of the loading, because you shouldn’t underload or overload. We are trying to be careful so that we manage potential injuries and potential cramping. I’m not used to having players that cramp,’’ Chilli Boys coach Daniel ‘Dance’ Malesela said.
‘‘I’m trying as much as possible to avoid those things. It’s very tight, it’s very difficult, we are trying to manage it as best as we can. We try to say let’s focus on one game, the other ones keep coming. One thing we have learnt to do is to accept the situation as it is. We are playing matches away, there will come a time when we will play matches in one place.’’
The deadly COVID-19 pandemic has forced the Chilli Boys play away since late December. The Eastern Cape, Port Elizabeth in particular, is a hot spot with numbers of positive cases rising daily.
Meanwhile, Chilli Boys’ new recruit Anthony Laffor, who joined the Port Elizabeth club last week, is determined to make sure that they don’t lose again.
The Chilli Boys, who are 12th on the Premiership table with nine points, have won twice, drawn three times and lost six matches.
‘‘We rested well, our preparations are going very well. We just need to keep our feet on the ground and listen to what our coach says. We are not planning to lose any games now,’’ former Sundowns striker Laffor said.
