Head coach Steve Komphela provided a cryptic response to Andile Jali's sending off after receiving a straight red card as Moroka Swallows suffered a 1-0 defeat to Mamelodi Sundowns in an MTN8 quarter-final.
Swallows crashed out of the competition at the Lucas Moripe Stadium on Saturday as Komphela's side were left with a mountain to climb after being reduced to 10 men after just seven minutes.
READ | Komphela calls for more discipline from Swallows
Komphela provided a cryptic response to the sending off in his first contest against his former side.
"There's two things in life, area of concern, area of change. [If] You can change something, change it, but if you can't change it, it's just a concern then you move on and these things happen in football and nobody knew that this [early red card] would happen.
"So whether you get disappointed or not, am I going to drown myself in a disappointment bucket or am I going to move on? you just have to move on. These things happen but it happened too early.
"So, all that I said is, 'okay, Steve now you are one man down,' then it's the responsibility of the team to learn to play one man down because we have not even gone to a stage at training where we're training two players down, three players down because you have to do that as a coach.
A horror return for Andile Jali ??The Swallows captain is sent off in the first ten minutes and is booed off by the crowd.?? Stream #MTN8 live: https://t.co/TesYUfoDS5 pic.twitter.com/5EE9YDxGCJ
— SuperSport Football ?? (@SSFootball) August 12, 2023
"If it happens in the match we have a problem because unfortunately, if it's four men down then it means the game has to be reconsidered, you need a minimum seven players to play the game.
"So, it tells me that at training I've not even done one man down, now when it happens here what do you do? then you have to find a way but again what do you take out of this? let's learn how to play one man down.
"First half, perfect. Second-half, mistake and then leading up until end of the match, we were still playing one man down without stressing even though after changing personnel you could see we were starting to disintegrate – they (Swallows players) did not have the same cohesion in the compartments like we did when we had Makhubela and Mtshali.
The Dube Birds now turn their attention back to the DStv Premiership where they meet Sekhukhune United on Wednesday at New Peter Mokaba Stadium.
Kick-off is at 19:30.
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