Africa-Press – Tanzania. DESPITE missing out on a chance to sail into CAF Champions League semifinals, Simba Head Coach Didier Gomes said he was proud of his players for their big commitment.
The Reds succeeded to stamp an emphatic 3-0 victory over South Africa’s Kaizer Chiefs in a largely one sided second leg encounter at the Benjamin Mkapa Stadium in Dar es Salaam over the weekend.
The outcome was however not enough to drive them into the last four stage of the campaign as their opponents enjoyed a 4-3 aggregate win thereby venturing in the semis.
Chiefs are now set to take on Moroccan side Wydad Casablanca in the two-legged semi-final tie next month.
Captain John Bocco who was on fire, scored a brace while his teammate Clatous Chama contributed one goal to complete a package of three deserved goals. “I’m very proud of my players because they showed big commitment.
It was a wonderful fighting spirit… they kept fighting until the end of the match without giving up. “Truly, we deserved to win. We had too many opportunities to score and to qualify but unfortunately, football sometimes is like this.
“If we managed better the first match, for sure, we could have reached into the semifinals. Regardless, we showed that we are one of the best teams in Africa.“We committed too many mistakes in the first match and the score was too big and better for our opponents,” Gomes said in a post-match briefing.
Several Simba players took to their Instagram pages to express their feelings after the sweaty 90 minutes of play. Locomotive midfielder Chama wrote: “Our champions’ league fairy-tale ends today.
I’m proud of this team because everyone gave their best performance but almost is never enough.
“We will not rest until we get it right. See you next season CAF CL and all the best to Kaizer Chiefs in their semifinal encounters.”
Also, full-back Mohamed Hussein wrote: “Thank you very much my fellow fighters, we have shown value of wearing Simba jersey.
We have shown the big part of Simba. “It was not easy but we fought until the last drop. Thanks to our fans, you are very important to us and next time, we will be much better.”
To the side of Kaizer Chiefs, their player Samir Nurkovic conceded that they expected a tough game but the most important thing was that they were through to the next stage.
“Simba is a very good team and we were expecting them to press us hard.
It was good that we created many chances in the first match and won with big margin,” he said. Mohamed Dewji wrote ‘Simba not only outplayed Kaizer Chiefs.
We made them look very mediocre.” Kaizer Chiefs Head Coach Gavin Hunt refused to take credit after he guided the Soweto giants to the semifinals for the first time in the club’s history.
Before the accomplished local tactician was appointed Chiefs coach in September 2020, Amakhosi had never reached the Champions League group stages, but he changed that and he led the Soweto giants to a second-place finish in Group C which saw the team reach the knockout phase.
Hunt has now made further history by guiding the Glamour Boys to the last four of Africa’s premier football club tournament and he insisted that the achievement is for the club.
“Well, it was history just to get into the group, and then… but obviously, yeah… it’s not for me, it’s for the club. It has nothing to do with me, it’s only the club,” Hunt told Chiefs’ media.
“It was obviously very difficult today but I mean, we got through and that’s the most important thing.”
“There was no danger for 25- 26 minutes, we got a corner and then they scored from that corner, which put us a little bit back and turned the first half (in their favour),” Hunt continued.
“They got a second and third (goal) and obviously made it a little difficult, and then we defended for the last bit of time.”
The former SuperSport United head coach said they expected Simba to attack in numbers and he was pleased to see his side weather the storm on the day.
“They’re the home team, they obviously were going to throw numbers forward – they left four (strikers) up, and they just played it long in there,” he added.
“If you don’t win the first and second ball, you’ve got problems and that was the problem. We couldn’t get [the ball] down for various reasons; we kept giving it away.
“But yeah, the most important thing is that we’re through – it’s a knockout game and we’re through.”
