Truter rues early goals as Chippa United exit Carling Knockout

Chippa United’s Carling Knockout campaign ended with a 4-0 defeat by Golden Arrows after coach Brandon Truter said his team never recovered from conceding early at King Zwelithini Stadium.

Junior Dion put Arrows ahead in the 10th minute on Saturday, forcing Chippa to chase the match. Truter felt his side’s difficulty in dealing with Golden Arrows’ aggressive pressing prevented them from building attacks and left them under sustained pressure in their own half.

“The boys wanted to win it but I give credit to Arrows. They played well. I think we could have done better with the goals, definitely could have done better with the goals but that put us under pressure from the start,” Truter said.

Chippa attempted to play out from the back but were punished for failing to bypass the high press. Truter also believed the second goal followed a lapse in their defensive positioning and a missed challenge.

“We should have handled one or two moments a bit better, especially with the press or the high press, we should have bypassed it. We opted to play out and got punished, ultimately in our defensive third but they got an early goal, that changed the dynamic and the mindset of course,” he said.

“Even the second one I think we could have done better, felt a little bit higher off the pitch but we carried out the repercussions after the missed tackle and they scored the second one.”

Truter made several changes to his starting XI after Chippa’s 1-0 league defeat by Kruger United. The coach had relied largely on the same team during the opening eight matches of the season, but Sammy Seabi, Obakhe Tshaya and Ibrahim Bance were among those brought into the side against Arrows.

He said the alterations were made to refresh the squad rather than experiment with his selection.

“Handed some starts here today, of course it looks like we are experimenting but these guys need to play. So far our line up has been consistent for the past eight games and we wanted to freshen it up a bit,” Truter added.

The Chippa coach made further changes at half-time, after which he felt his team controlled more of the contest and pushed Golden Arrows into a deeper defensive shape. However, the visitors could not take advantage of the opportunities they created.

“Unfortunately at half time we needed to make a decision because the boys really wanted it today. I made the changes at half time, I was then forced to a very deep defensive block and we created chance after chance after chance and still didn’t score,” he said.

Truter said his greater concern would have been failing to create chances, although he acknowledged that Chippa’s finishing remained an issue to address in training.

“The concern for me in terms of finishing it, it would have been a concern if we didn’t create chances but it’s bound to quality at this point but it’s something we worked on. It things that we are there to coach but better performance in the second half.”