'Winning trophies must become an addiction and a drug for us': Tinkler

SuperSport United coach Eric Tinkler was the epitome of cool and calmness after winning his second trophy as a coach at the Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban on Saturday night.

After his team’s 4-2 penalty-shoot win over Cape Town City in a MTN 8 final that finished 1-1 after 120 minutes‚ Tinkler hardly showed his delight‚ at least facially.

He described his cup win as a fantastic start to his SuperSport stint‚ adding he's very excited and he even joked by saying: “That's why I'm wearing the ring.”

But being the hard-working and no frills coach that we've come to know‚ Tinkler added that he was still determined to achieve more with the club.

“Being the type of the person I am‚ I want more. We have another massive game coming up at the weekend and I want us to win it so that we can get to another final. Winning trophies must become an addiction and a drug for us. That's where you major yourself against the best‚" said Tinkler‚ whose side will leave for Tunisia on Thursday where they will meet Club Africain in the second-leg of the Caf Confederation Cup in Tunis on Sunday.

The first leg of the Confed Cup tie finished 1-1 in Pretoria two weeks ago.

Tinkler couldn't stop‚ though‚ raving and thanking his players for showing “great character‚ great resilience and great determination" in order to bag the MTN 8 trophy‚ which was a first for him within four months at SuperSport.

The win was a sweet one for Tinkler against his former club he won his first trophy with‚ ironically playing against his current team in the Telkom Knockout final last season.

Tinkler praised goalkeeper Ronwen Williams for saving Lyle Lakay and Judas Moseamedi’s spot kicks after they literally dragged themselves to penalties when they were forced to finish the match with 10 men due to Thabo Mnyamane's groin injury.

Mnyamane suffered the injury while cancelling out Sibusiso Masina's 23rd minute opener in the 80th minute.

"We had a lot of faith in our goalkeeper Ronwen and we had practiced taking penalties during the week. Ronwen was brilliant in saving those penalties‚" said Tinkler.

"I think we really started the game well. We controlled the match and I don't think they hurt us in the first 15 minutes. We created one or two chances. But I think in that phase of the game there wasn't real fluidity in our play when we were attacking. We had too many stray passes... passes were not reaching the intended target.

"I thought we'll quickly get better but unfortunately that wasn't the case. We started to get caught a couple of times on a counter and obviously they got the goal.

"We didn't really finish off the first half that well in my personal view. So we obviously had to bring other players on. I thought the intensity of our attack needed to increase. I thought City pressed with a lot more determination than us and we struggled to really to make two or three passes."

As the game moved towards the end‚ frustration was unbearable and written all over Tinkler's face.

"We obviously had to change our formation in the second half and I thought that had a positive effect‚ although they were still hurting us once or twice on the counter. We started to come more into the game‚" said the former Bafana Bafana midfielder.

"We brought Sifiso Myeni to try and get ourselves back into the game and we also changed the formation at the back from four to three. And that's when we got the goal through Thabo Mnyamane who we also lost through injury at the same time.

"But that's the risk we took when we brought all those players. With only about 15 minutes left on the clock we needed to get ourselves back into the game. And it paid off."

After losing Mnyamane‚ Tinkler's side showed they were lacking in numbers‚ struggling to put any meaningful attack going forward.

"What happened after that...‚ I'm not going to even talk about. What we saw there was a show of great‚ character‚ great resilience and great determination from the guys. The legs were going and it was expected given the type of season that we've had. I'm so proud of the boys."

Tinkler said they will have no time to celebrate this victory but he will give all those who played in the final a two-day off before resuming training on Tuesday.

"We'll also have to assess all the players who had bruises and injuries in this final. It does worry me because we don't have a big squad. But it's very difficult to sit down and evaluate the situation now."