Johannesburg - Despite finishing the 2015/16 season without any silverware, Orlando Pirates coach Eric Tinkler believes that finishing in the top half of the Absa Premiership was vital to their season.
Pirates finished their season occupying seventh places on the log table and also lost two cup finals, the Nedbank Cup and the CAF Confederation Cup.
The former Bafana Bafana midfielder admits that finishing inside the top eight was so vital for the Soweto giants.
“Obviously it has been a very long season for us as a team, with the lots of traveling across the continents,” Tinkler told Sport24.
“But the few positives out of last season including reaching the CAF Confederations cup final obviously, although we didn’t win it we’ll take credit for that.
“Also our recovery within the domestic league was so vital for us and we managed to finish inside the top eight despite our ups and downs.
“It wasn’t going to be good if we missed out on finishing inside for the first time in the club history.
“And again we reached the final of the Nedbank Cup which we lost unfortunately but otherwise the boys really tried their best.”
Last week Sport24 reported that former Nigeria national coach Stephen Keshi is being linked with replacing Tinkler as head coach of the Buccaneers.
Keshi has since denied reports with Tim Sukazi (agent) further stating that there has been no contact from Pirates to enquire about the services of Keshi.