Bees to face heavy turbulence

After winning six out of seven games in the ABC Motsepe League, Tornado will want to continue their unbeaten run when they face an old foe, EC Bees, at the Bhisho Stadium this afternoon.

The Mdantsane outfit will go into this game as underdogs, as the “Crazy Gang” have in the past managed to tame them well, after Tornado suffered two major losses at the hands of the Bhisho-based outfit last season.

This season the two sides have only met once, when Bees visited Tornado at North End Stadium and again proved to be the better side when they beat Tshepo Motsoeneng’s charges 2-1.

But Motsoeneng wasn’t concerned at all about their encounter, saying they had a tough time last weekend when they locked horns with last season’s runners-up Future Tigers, who are now sitting on the third position on the log-standings.

“With all due respect to Bees but last week’s match was a better one. We had everything to fight for. What are we fighting for with Bees, because even if we lose we will still be sitting at number one.

“But going into this game – we’ve never upset Bees in the history of the club, so there’s so much at stake for them. We are always underdogs when we meet them and once we break that view we gonna have a free flow against them.”

Motsoeneng said they wanted to amend their bad record against Bees, but it won’t be a walk in the park due to rains that have showered Bhisho Stadium for more than three days.

“Bees struggle with teams that are not well structured but with the well structured clubs they are able to come out, as they are used to playing teams who are well organised.

“The field might spoil a beautiful game. I just wish the game was at North End so that nothing would distract both teams, but we will have to rise to the occasion.”

He said he was satisfied with the progress they have made, staying at the summit of the standings with 19 points after they only dropped two points against Mthatha City, but he still expected a tactical game from Chippa Njedu’s charges.

“Luckily we don’t have any injuries but the field is most probably water-logged right now, or either way too soft for proper football to be played.”

Bees coach Njedu said the fact that every team wanted to prove themselves against them made matters worse for them.

“We play against a team now and beat them, but when we go and watch the same team playing another team, they don’t have that hunger they had when they played us. You’d swear a person could even die,” he chuckled.

He said they had a tough time dealing with grounds in Butterworth when they played a 1-1 stalemate against the former students, but he was not worried about their encounter with the log leaders.

“It was just an open pitch with long grass because their pitch was under maintenance. But I don’t want to seem like I’m making excuses because they gave us a good game.

“I trust my young boys, and if we want to be in a good position in the second round we should beat Tornado.”

Njedu said he preferred not to dwell on the past as they have managed to upset Tornado on many occasions.

“They are a big team and they are doing very well so far, so we need to be cautious.”