Solinas: We played without six key players

Cape Town - Kaizer Chiefs coach Giovanni Solinas bemoaned the absence of key players after Amakhosi were given a scare by Black Leopards in the Telkom Knockout on Sunday.

The Soweto giants needed penalties to book a place in the quarter-finals, having come from a goal down to force a 1-1 draw during the 90 minutes.

The Italian mentor was without six of his regulars for the match with Lidoda Duhva, such as Lebogang Manyama, Khama Billiat and Leonardo Castro, who are all out nursing injuries.

"First half my boys did not play well. But at halftime we fixed the mistakes, we talked about the problem. In the second half I saw another Kaizer Chiefs. In the second half the performance was outstanding, also in extra time," Solinas told SuperSport.

"The distance was not right, we did not press the ball. The distance was not right in between the departments (lines). Defensively we had no coordination of movement with the ball. So always we opened the space, this was the main problem. We needed to move the ball quickly from one side to another.

"I knew today was going to be difficult for us. We played without six key players. Six key players. We don't have (Leonardo) Castro, (Khama)Billiat, Lebogang Manyama, (Dumisani) Zuma, (Siyabonga) Ngezana (and Daniel Cardoso).

"Also, Real Madrid or Barcelona would struggle without six key players. It was a stressful game for us. I lost two years of my life today. It's an emotional game when you go into penalty shoot-outs you know it's a lottery."