Sundowns’ impressive Nasir, Allende not fully integrated yet: Mngqithi

Mamelodi Sundowns imports Abubeker Nasir and Marcelo Allende have hit the ground running in the Premier Soccer League (PSL), but co-coach Manqoba Mngqithi insists they are still not fully integrated into the Brazilians' playing style.

Ethiopian Nasir has made two substitute appearances with one goal in the league, while Chilean Allende has featured in a league and an MTN8 match where he scored a goal apiece.

“It is not always an easy exercise, even now you won’t really say they are completely integrated into the group,” Mngqithi said as Sundowns prepare to take on SuperSport United in their DStv Premiership clash at Pretoria's Lucas Moripe Stadium on Friday (7.30pm).

“They have done well by scoring some important goals and they have had some very good matches.

“The integration of players normally takes a bit longer, but sometimes we are lucky that a player or players adapt to our playing concept quickly. That is probably because they will be coming from teams using almost the same formation or maybe the style of play is not too different.

“With our type of football, I think it’s also easier to fit in if you are a technically gifted player because it is a playing concept that requires a lot of finesse, movement, intelligence and running.

“We work very hard off the ball to try to make sure we don’t give an advantage to the opposition. There are very few matches where we give away big chances, but when we [do, it] is probably because of one or two errors.

“It is normally easy to bring players into our system because even our identification process requires that we look at what can influence our playing concept or our playing philosophy better.

“When you look at the position Allende plays and the position for his national team, it makes it easier for you to know exactly what you think that particular player could bring to your set-up.

“The same thing with Nasir — we saw a lot of matches of him and we know exactly what type of a specimen we are looking for to try to get us what we believe will help in our attacking play.

“We must congratulate them for being able to get into a team with so much pressure [to make the line-up]. It is not easy for all these players to come into this group and not lose their confidence because there is competition for places.”

Sundowns' league game against SuperSport is a rematch of Sunday's MTN8 quarterfinal, where Nasir and Allende came off the bench to score in a 2-0 win for the Brazilians.