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Stars our hoodoo: Mosimane

Pretoria - Following his side's 1-1 Premiership draw with Platinum Stars on Wednesday, Mamelodi Sundowns coach Pitso Mosimane has described the team from Rustenburg as a "hoodoo" for his outfit and praised Stars for their resilience.

Sundowns took the lead through Dove Wome in the 57th minute, but it was not enough, as Stars hit back 10 minutes from time, leaving the teams in a share of the points.

"It was a good game, an end-to-end game and both teams attacked," Mosimane said at Loftus Versfeld after the game.

"We played against a very good team. They are our "hoodoo" team… they always give us problems and they never die.

"We score first, they always come back. We played them here (Loftus) in the Nedbank Cup (last season) and they came back.

"Today (Wednesday) we scored and they came back. They always have a scrappy goal that they score against us, on a set-piece second-play and something happens."

Wome, who joined from Free State Stars in June, scored a somewhat fortunate free kick, after Stars goalkeeper Siyabonga Mpontshane failed to deal with the shot which came straight at him.

But the visitors refused to go away and stole a point, courtesy of Robert Nga'mbi's accurate header inside a crowded area.

Mosimane said he was pleased with some aspects of Sundowns' play, particularly with the way in which the home side dominated possession and created a number of chances in the second half.

"We did well, we tried to win the game. We forced and we pushed, we showed that we were playing at home and we attacked a lot," Mosimane said.

"We scored the goal but, to be honest, we should have taken it (won the game) with Dove Wome in the first half when he had a one-on-one with the goalkeeper.

"He decided to go on his weak foot instead of his right foot and when you play against a team like this, you must take your chances."

Mosimane was referring to Wome's early first-half chance, when he was put through on goal after some slack defence from Stars, but the former Free State Stars forward fizzed his first chance wide of goal.

He made amends, however, shortly before the hour mark, slotting home his first ever goal for Sundowns with a thunderous effort.

Although Mosimane was disappointed with the result, he felt Stars deserved plenty of praise for their style of play and was happy to have bagged four points from his first two league games of the new season.

"We're disappointed with the result because we thought we would win.

"I put all the strikers I had in the team onto the field to try and win.

"It's football, it's life, we should accept it and the performance was not the greatest, but very good.

"We'd love to have six points. But let's respect this team (Stars). They came second last season and they attack. They play on the break."

Meanwhile, Dikwena boss Allan Freese said he was delighted to have earned a point against strong opposition and was likewise full of praise for his team's efforts.

"Not bad at all to get a point from a team that's worth 10 times more than my team," Freese said about the former Premiership champions.

"I'm happy we could come back and equalise, because the goal we conceded - I'm not going to blame anybody for it - I just think maybe we could have done better defending it.

"But I'm happy at the end of the day. In the first half I thought we did very well, although I think we could have got a goal."

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