Fadlu Davids and Mandla Ncikazi will lead Orlando Pirates at the start of the season, following the shock departure of Josef Zinnbauer, and Davids has revealed that the duo have been tasked with winning and bringing back the club’s style of play while they are in charge.

Zinnbauer resigned on Monday just four days before the start of the new DStv Premiership campaign and now his former assistant coaches in Davids and Mcikazi will fill the void.

With Zinnbauer gone, Davids represented Pirates at the DStv Premiership season launch at FNB Stadium in Johannesburg on Wednesday.

The Sea Robber could be looking to follow Mamelodi Sundowns’ example by appointing two co-coaches but any decision like that will largely be based on how the team starts the season with the first test coming against Stellenbosch at Orlando Stadium on Saturday (3pm).

“Coach Mandla and I have been given a mandate to win on Saturday. We’ve to get the job done on Saturday and that’s it. We come a long way, we’ve worked together before [at Maritzburg United] and we share the same football idea,’’ said Davids at the launch.

“There’s no title [to call him and Ncikazi],” he added when quizzed on the similarities to the Downs setup.

“We want to play good football. We want to play high intensity football and be a really hard-working team even when we don’t have the ball,’’ Davids continued.

“In the two training sessions we had, our task was to bring back the Orlando Pirates’ style of play. Our other task is to win. We want to have that compactness and when we have the ball, we want to see it running on the ground, playing free flowing football.”