SuperSport United coach Kaitano Tembo says that Kaizer Chiefs coach Giovanni Solinas’ tactics in their MTN8 semi-final clash were perfect for Matsatsantsa.

Bradley Grobler netted the decisive goal in the second-leg semi-final clash to ensure that Tembo’s side advanced to their sixth final in three years.

Tembo admits that he expected Chiefs to come at them harder in the first few minutes of the clash given that it was their home ground, in addition to commenting on their decision to field two defensive midfielders in Willard Katsande and Wiseman Meyiwa.

‘I thought they [Chiefs] would be the ones coming off the blocks first but surprisingly they were a little hesitant‚’ he told Sowetan Live.

‘Probably it was all mental‚ they had a two-goal advantage. I think their approach was to prevent us from scoring.

‘I had thought they would come out and try to get an early goal and that’s why our approach was to try and drag it 0-0 for longer and luckily enough that did happen.

‘In the second half, we had nothing to do but attack because we had nothing to lose. When I saw the Chiefs lineup, I knew that they wanted to protect their two away-goals advantage.

‘They now had two defensive midfielders in Willard and Meyiwa‚ which meant [Siphelele] Ntshangase will push a little bit higher.

‘It was a little easy to close them up because this lineup meant [Leonardo] Castro and [Khama] Billiat were playing far apart than they were in the first leg.

‘They were a little bit spread and it was easy for us to cover those distances.

‘I thought their tactics suited us,’ he concluded.

The victory allowed SuperSport to set up a repeat of the 2017 MTN8 final where they will face Cape Town City in a bid to defend their title.

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