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Cape Town - Eric Tinkler declared his intentions ahead of the Absa Premiership clash against Ajax Cape Town on Wednesday evening.
The Orlando Pirates head coach admits his charges are looking to work their way up the log table by beating the Urban Warriors who currently occupy 11th place; with 19 points - two more than the Buccaneers.
The Sea Robbers find themselves in unfamiliar territory, currently placed 13th on the PSL log standings.
However, Tinkler believes a good result against Ajax will turn things around for him and his charges.
“No one is happy with our current log position and we want to make up for our poor start with a good result against Ajax,” said Tinkler on the club’s website.
“We have played them (Ajax) twice already this season, once in the MTN8 and once in the League so we more or less know what to expect on Wednesday. Personally, I’m looking forward to the match up against them.”
He added: “Quite frankly we need the points so an opportunity to grab all three points on the evening will be welcomed.”
It is the home side who will come into this match with the upper hand having won the last match between the two sides.
Tinkler reveals he will be drawing inspiration from this match as well as the fighting spirit in the Soweto Derby to rally his troops.
“It’s clear that we are not in a favourable position in terms of the log standings but I have faith in the players that together we can turn things around.
“We are all fighters here and we understand that for a brand like Orlando Pirates we need to do a lot more and we are highly motivated to fight to rectify the situation.
“You saw the fighting spirit on Saturday and now we look towards building on that.
“We are playing Ajax at home and it is vitally important that we get all three points against them. I mean we obviously need to improve our position on the log standings but we can only do that by getting back to winning ways which should boost the confidence of the team as well.
“Our approach will be to play an offensive and high tempo game, take advantage of our speed, use our skill to penetrate their defence and go for goals; but off course having said that we must be mindful of our defence and keep things tight at the back to deny them any goal scoring opportunities.”
“As for Ajax; I expect a tough game, they got a positive result against Arrows so they will still be feeling good about that. It’s a fact that everybody wants to beat Pirates so we know we are going to have a fight on our hands.
"I suppose they also know that we will come hard against them in search of goals, so I think the counter attack will be in play from them tomorrow. We have discussed this with our defence and we will be prepared for that."
Kick-off is at 19:30.
