Mamelodi Sundowns has made a flying start to life in Group B, accumulating 6 points out of 6, a perfect start for the 2016 CAF CL champions as they look to continue where they left off last year, with a run that saw them topping their group unbeaten. The outfit hailing from Tshwane is one of the 3 teams that that boasts a 100% win record in this year’s group stages, sharing this feat with Tanzanian outfit, Simba SC, who recently caused an upset to the current holders Al Ahly and Moroccan outfit, Wydad Casablanca, who tore South African runner ups, Kaizer Chiefs, to shreds over the weekend.
Despite Sundowns scoring a walloping 5 goals away from home, their head coach, Manqoba Mnqithi was rather reserved after the encounter, in the post-match interview, Mnqithi stated his concern about how his side took its feet off the paddle, losing concentration just at the end of the first half, which led to the home side getting an equaliser despite the fact that Sundowns had a numerical advantage.
Although Sundowns has moved from being the hunter to the hunted in this competition, they now step into familiar territory, a place they have never picked up a win before, this weekend, Mazembe will welcome Sundowns at the Mazembe Stadium once again, these two sides have played 3 games at that historic venue with the Congolese side picking up 2 victories and a draw, scoring 6 goals with only one reply from Sundowns, overall though, Sundowns do boast 3 home victories themselves in 7 overall fixtures between the two, their last encounter there saw TP Mazembe put aside Mamelodi Sundowns 3-1 in the first round encounter, Mazembe eventually won that edition of the Champions league and their then coach, Patrice Cateron, quoted saying that Mamelodi Sundowns was the toughest outfit they had faced in that competition that year.
The Masandawana faithfuls will be backing their side to come out of Kinshasa with a win this time around as Sundowns boasts one of the meanest attacks in African football and a defence that has kept 12 clean sheets in all competitions this season alone, facing a side that is yet to score in the group stages. Mazembe have looked like shadow of their former self in this year’s edition and Sundowns will be hoping to capitalize on that when they meet this weekend.
Sundowns will be boosted by the return to form by talisman Themba Zwane who looked close to his perfect form against CR Belouizdad as he controlled proceeding the entire game, a performance that earned him a place at the best 11 of the match day week, he shared that stage with his fellow teammate Kermit Erasmus who has also been putting massive shifts coming from the bench recently with 4 goal contributions in his last 3 games as a sub
TP Mazembe have confirmed that they will be without Godet Masenga, Isaac Tshibangu and Cedric Zemba who got a second caution of the match for time wasting, this will be a huge blow for the 2015 champions who desperately need to get their campaign going. Sundowns will go into this game with a near full strength squad with Denis Onyango confirmed to be ready for this clash.
It is a match not to be missed, dubbed as the biggest fixture on the African continent this weekend, all eyes will be on this mouth-watering clash. Kick-off is at 15h00(CAT).
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