Barker: You can see they left everything on the field

Stellenbosch FC coach Steve Barker says he could see his players left everything on the field following their victory over Kaizer Chiefs in the DStv Premiership on Tuesday.

The Maroons extended their unbeaten run to 19 matches after a 46th minute goal by Devon Titus at the FNB Stadium to hand them the win over Amakhosi.

The win sees Stellies maintain second place in the DStv Premiership standings with 38 points after 21 games, having won 11, drawn five and conceded five defeats.

Barker expressed his satisfaction with his team’s performance to collect maximum points on the road and walk away with another clean sheet.

“I thought first half we played really well, I think we controlled, created most of the better chances, we were able to get behind them a lot, especially on the right hand side with Titus. A lot of box entries and I think we deserved to get the goal and go to the half-time (break with the lead),” Barker told SuperSport TV after the game.

“Second half they applied a lot of pressure on us and I think it was just a situation where we had to defend deeper, dig deep and hopefully on a transition we could then get the second goal and kill it off.

“But it was tough in the second half, they put us on the back foot, we had to defend a lot and we were not able to create many chances in the second-half. But sometimes it is the way it is. You’ve got the goal just before half-time, obviously a good time to score.”

“But again I can’t fault the effort these players have put in, week in and week out. You can just see they are ready to put everything on the field and leave nothing out there and so congratulations to the club for the magnificent run we’re on and I also want to thank the supporters for supporting us the way they do,” he continued.

“I think that’s massive, back-to-back clean-sheets in this league, three days apart is really massive. You know we’ve got a lot of good quality attacking players, we seem to be scoring on a regular basis.

“So if we can shut the back door, keep the clean-sheets, then it gives us the belief and the confidence that we can win matches and I think today was a prime example of that. We got our goal and really dug deep not to concede.”

Stellies will be hoping to extend their unbeaten run even further when they take on Sekhukhune United at the Danie Craven Stadium on Saturday, with kick-off set for 8pm.

Photo by Gavin Barker/BackpagePix