A beaming Eric Tinkler hailed the scintillating performances of young duo Taahir Goedeman and Jaeden Rhodes as Cape Town City grabbed a dramatic DStv Premiership opening day 1-0 win over Polokwane City at Athlone Stadium on Sunday.
Substitute Joaquim Paciencia scored a dramatic 92nd-minute winner on debut as the Citizens ended as deserved winners after a dominant display.
READ | CT City leave it late to punish Polokwane
The 23-year-old Goedeman produced a marauding performance in midfield while the even younger Rhodes at 20 years old caught the eye with moments of magic on the flanks.
Rhodes' crowd-pleasing bits of skill could easily have even made the cut of the popular SuperSport extra time Kasi Flava compilation videos.
"I think Jaeden can go a long, long way," Tinkler said post-match.
"During our six-week pre-season, there were two players for me who stepped up and showed a lot more maturity which they lacked this season and two seasons ago, which is Jaeden Rhodes and Taahir Goedeman.
"The two of them have stepped up, they've worked extremely hard throughout our pre-season.
"I think Jaeden is showing, in particular, that he should be in my starting 11 every week. I think his whole level of professionalism, his mentality has changed.
"He doesn't see himself as a development player anymore, and Taahir Goedeman, the same. Both are of the view that the coach counts on us, we need to be providing more.
"I'm very, very happy for that and the beauty about both of them is their creativity, where both have unbelievable creativity on the ball and in small spaces can create scoring situations."
Tinkler added that despite their young ages and perhaps inexperience, both will be expected to contribute significantly to the Cape side's success.
"Both of them need to be scoring more goals," Tinkler added.
"That's the one thing we're lacking from Jaeden, but we see a lot of it in training, so now it's about taking what he has in training and turning it into goals in the league.
"I'm quite excited for those two."
Tinkler's side next face an away trip to Dobsonville Stadium for a DStv Premiership clash against Moroka Swallows on Wednesday.
Kick-off is at 19:30.
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