Highlanders will not be demoralised by back-to-back defeats in the hands of CAPS United and Harare City, but will take the set-back as a wake-up call as the team prepares for a trip to Triangle, technical manager Mandla ‘Lulu’ Mpofu has said.
On Sunday Bosso was condemned to a second defeat in a space of seven days when the team succumbed to a power sapping home 0-1 defeat in the hands of Harare City who have been struggling to find their feat prior to their weekend victory over the Bulawayo giants.
Harare City who are now under the guidance of former CAPS United coach Lloyd Chitembwe scored the only goal of the match against the run of play in the 20th minute through Jerry Chipangura after William Manondo beat centre-back Tendai Ndlovu to provide a low cross inside the box, finding an unmarked Chipangura face-to-face with goalkeeper Ariel Sibanda and tapped the ball in.
Chitembwe had masterminded Highlanders’ 1-2 defeat to fellow NetOne sponsored side Caps United seven days ago, in his last match as the Green Machine boss before crossing over to their city rivals the following day.
After the Harare City match, Mpofu bemoaned the scoring opportunities which his charges could not take, also adding that the defeat was a wake-up call.
“If you miss chances you are bound to be punished, exactly what happened today. In terms of performance I think I can’t complain, they did very well, good performance but it’s not good enough if you don’t win,” he said.
“But we are not demoralised, we will rise. Its a good wake-up call I think as a coach, but overall performance I will say the other team worked so hard, we did not work as much as we wanted, but I am not happy the way we missed those chances, we could have scored a goal or two,” Mpofu said.
“We are not panicking, we are left with 14 matches we can win them and win the league, if you look at the log. As I said, I will never stop digging as a coach, to make sure we win our games,” Mpofu added.
On Thursday Bosso will travel to Chiredzi to face the country’s CAF Confederation Cup representatives Triangle FC who overpowered Rukinzo of Burundi by a 5-0 aggregate scoreline to set a next round tie against Azam of Tanzania.
The lowveld side is currently enjoying a rich vein of form, but Highlanders go to this match banking on history.
Last season in the same fixture Bosso emerged 1-0 victors courtesy of a Newman Sianchali first half strike.