Amazulu

AmaZulu newly coach, Cavin Johnson has explained how he has his sights set on reviving Usuthu’s happier days in between smoothing the introduction of some of his newer charges to the Absa Premiership stage.

The 58 year old tactician had to hit the ground running after arriving in Durban on Wednesday in time for a friendly match with NFD neighbours Real Kings.

“We’re going to have to know how to play, when to have two training sessions, and when to have one training session in order to make sure that they get the information in their heads, so that they can come out and play a good game of football against Free State Stars,” he said in an interview published on the club’s official website.

According to Johnson the emphasis for the next few days centers on the physical and mental conditioning of the players. “For us now and for me always, I say, the brain never gets tired; its one thing that God made that never gets tired. We need to feed them that way, with the football we plan to play this year at AmaZulu.”

“We’ve got to play around with that physical conditioning and mental conditioning, and see how they adapt. Hopefully they will be able to play good games or a few games at the start of the season this year.”

“We’ve got to adjust some of the players into the PSL; it’s a different ball game. It is a much tougher game, but at the same time it’s a more enjoyable game playing in the PSL, but like always I like my teams to play football,” said Johnson.

A lot can be said about how new coaches seek to implement their own approach in playing style immediately but the former Ted Dimitru understudy has other ideas on the matter.

“When I look at it back and I say to myself, is Cavin Johnson coming with something new to AmaZulu? No. AmaZulu are used to playing football. And that’s exactly the cloth within AmaZulu that I will wake up.”

“It’s not a Cavin Johnson philosophy; it’s an AmaZulu philosophy that was there many years ago. We need to revive it. We need to make sure that we play the type of football that was played way back, when AmaZulu were still strong,” he enthuses.

Message to the fans

“It’s called Hebe, Hebe, hey? Usuthu! Please guys come out. We’re not promising the world, but rally behind the players that we have, and for sure we’re going to try and put our best foot forward by playing the kind of football that will make the old AmaZulu fan come back to the stadium,” said Johnson.