After winning the league with Bidvest Wits in 2016-17, your team struggled in the following season and ended up finishing outside the top eight - but you seem to have turned things around this time. How did you do it?
Nothing different. Just a few different players. We still won a trophy (Telkom Knockout) which is more than a lot of teams have done ... much bigger teams than us. So, yah, I mean football can go either way.
A lot of games were tight and going this way and that way last year and went the other way for us. We're not doing anything different, we are keeping the same structure, trying to play the same way. Obviously we want to improve.
Can we read too much into you now being top of the table after 20 games?
This league is a little bit of a false league and it's not right what's going on because it's not a proper race. It's not a proper race because you get someone who has played less or more games. When we played Champions League we had to play and it didn't matter who we were playing.
We arrived a day before a game in Egypt from East London and played the next day against Al Ahly and lost 1-0. For me to be two or three games behind is not a proper race. We just keep going and do what we have to do and go from there.
Would you say being out of Caf competitions brings an element of advantage to your team, especially when looking at your league rivals Orlando Pirates and Mamelodi Sundowns who are still battling it out in the group stages of this year's Champions League?
It's disappointing because I want to be there and I like to be there, we want to play there.
But is not being there making any difference to your title chase?
Not at all, not at all. I think it hinders you. I think it's better to play more games. You get to know your squad being tested and more players getting more games, you know. Now we want to be there, I wanted to be there.
It's the first time I've missed being there in many, many years, so I'm disappointed from that perspective. Hopefully we can get back in there this year.
Are you seriously not taking being out of the Caf competitions as an advantage?
No, no, no advantage, no advantage. I would rather play in two or three days. I think it makes your team stronger and it makes your team better. What you need is the know-how in between games, what you need to do and what not to do.
But the travelling ... it's never easy like, say, Europe in Africa?
Travelling keeps the team closer and it bonds the team more. You are more together, and play more. It's how you rotate your team and you use your team. And obviously a lot of teams have been having some games called off and pushed off, we never had that in any year of ours. We've always been playing ... we had to play. Fixtures dealt with us and we played.
There should be some advantage when you get to the Caf competition with the calender having been changed?
Most definitely it will be better for any SA team, definitely. At least everybody is coming back to their senses a bit.
In your current chase for the league, there have been a couple of players who've been ever-present on your team sheet. Players like goalkeeper Darren Keet and Deon Hotto have not missed a match, with Thabang Monare, Cole Alexander, Robyn Johannes, Thulani Hlatshwayo, Buhle Mkhwanazi and Sifiso Hlanti close behind. Are these key to your title chase?
In any team in the world you will have key (players) in the team and then you obviously try keep your core playing as long as you can. That leads to consistency, leads to everything else. That's what you're trying to do. Any team in the world, there's no difference. Any team that has won anything uses fewer players.
Any team that won the league, you can even look at last year, whoever won the league ... Sundowns, they used fewer players. So that's what it is. So that's what normally happens. Generally the teams that are at the bottom of the log use more players because they are chopping and changing their team all the time. Teams that are winning use fewer players.
We've seen Hotto playing for Golden Arrows and Bloemfontein Celtic but he was never as good as we've seen him with you this season. What have you injected in him?
I just think it's the way you want him to play football, which you know you've got to dictate to him what you want from him and how you want it. So that's pretty much.
He's got goals in him, he's got assists in him but he needs to be better because there's a lot of things to come. We've only got a half a season with him. But hopefully we can improve him. Obviously his age (28)... but I mean we can improve him.
You must be happy that the goals are coming from everyone in the team?
We haven't won anything yet, we've won nothing but any team that wins anything, goals come from all over the show. Restarts, set pieces, corners, free kicks, tap ins, 30 yards ... good teams can score all those types of goals. So hopefully, as I said, we can score more. We're certainly not scoring enough from certain areas of the pitch but hopefully we are working on everything.
There's been a lot of speculation about the future of your No 1 goalkeeper. I heard he might be heading back overseas next season?
No, not at all. Darren didn't want to go to (Kaizer) Chiefs ... it's not a good move for him to go there. He's got a team here where he can win things and he feels he can win more here than he can at Chiefs.
But is he moving overseas next season?
The bottom line for him is that he wants to go back overseas and that's all in the lap of himself, my CEO and his agent. I can only add my five cents in there.
In terms of how this championship is going, who do you see as your main challengers?
In SA football, the consistency levels are not the same as in European teams. So it doesn't matter who buys the most players but I think the consistency levels are not the same. I think the league is more competitive than you think. Anybody can beat anybody. I mean we played Maritzburg United at home.
Now if any team in the world or European league played who's top of the league and bottom of the league, it should be quite an easy victory. It was a hard game, I mean we could have been one nil down and Maritzburg could have won the game.
So the consistency levels are not very good in SA football in terms of winning every week. I think if you are a betting man the hardest place to win money is in SA because you can never say. In SA it is very difficult.
But surely, coach, having won the league four times you should be able to call it now. Some people are already saying it's in your hands?
They said the same thing two weeks ago and then we lost and we drew matches and they said we can't win it, we are choking. So it doesn't really matter and I don't really listen to it. I actually don't read any of the newspapers.
Is it too early for you to say where the title is going?
It's 10 or 11 games to go and as I said, it's a false league. You play three more games than Sundowns and you play two more games than Pirates. It's not right. Yes I understand they are in the Champions League but it never happened to us. But we can't concentrate on that, we just have to concentrate on what we do...