Chippa United need to be aggressive and show more hunger to win matches in the second leg of the Absa Premiership, long-serving player Andile Mbenyane says.
The club have had a poor start to their league campaign in 2018, which resulted in them finishing the first leg of their league run second from the bottom on the log table.
Chippa have managed to score only two wins, six draws and seven defeats from the 15 fixtures played so far.
The team’s disappointing performance has also seen the axing of two coaches in Dan Malesela and his successor Eric Tinkler.
“If our first round had been good we would have been lying in an impressive position on the log at the moment,” Mbenyane said.
“We are second from the bottom right now and that just shows that we had a bad start to the season.”
The 29-year-old attacking midfielder said the changes in the coaching staff had also contributed to the team’s position on the log.
However, he said that players needed to man up.
“It’s not the coaches who play on the field, it’s players.
“We don’t take responsibility of how we play on the field.
“We need to be aggressive and show more hunger to win games.
“During the first round we did not show any hunger. It seemed as if the spirit was not there.
“Most of the time we do things at training, but come match day we do not implement them.
“All the coaches who have been with us so far have pushed us, but we don’t know what happened,” he said.
“We wanted to see ourselves in the top eight before the break, but we only realised late that we were dropping on the log because we were losing games.
“And in the games that we were meant to win at home we played to draws.”
After their 2-0 defeat to logleaders Bidvest Wits in their previous fixture, the Chilli Boys only had four days to rest.
They are back on the grind as they prepare for the second leg of the league.
Mbenyane welcomed the early start, saying: “I think opening early while we are still hungry to win games will help, because now we are looking forward to winning games.
“In every match that we play we have to make sure that we get three points.
“I know it won’t be easy as every team will push hard in the second round, but we have to show that we want it more.
“We want to move from our position on the log.”