Bartlett pleased with Spurs’ character

Cape Town Spurs head coach Shaun Bartlett hailed his side’s fighting spirit as they dented University of Pretoria’s title prospects with a 2-2 draw at Athlone Stadium on Sunday.

The Urban Warriors got off to a flying start when Eyona Ndondo opened the scoring after just six minutes to register his second goal in two matches and a fourth of the season.

However, Spurs switched off at the back in the closing stages of the first half to allow AmaTuks to score twice in the space of eight minutes to go into the break with a one-goal lead.

The club needed at least a point to secure our GladAfrica Championship status for next season and Ashley Cupido duly provided it when he equalised 12 minutes from time.

The coach is looking to play spoiler once again this weekend when we travel to Durban to face league leaders Richards Bay, who are two points ahead of Tuks going into the final game of the campaign.

“For us as Cape Town Spurs last week against University of Pretoria was a massive game. We knew they were going to come with the intention of wanting to stay in the race for winning automatic promotion,” Bartlett said.

“We needed to get one point at least to secure our status for next season and we started the game really well, getting an early goal, but then lapse of concentration cost us two goals and we showed a bit of character and fighting spirit to come back to eventually get the point.

“It’s going to be no different this coming week. Obviously being the spoiler of last weekend’s result against Tuks, we’re hoping to repeat that performance. We said to the players we would like the end this season on a high.”