‘AFCON finals perfect opportunity for Mhango’

Africa Cup of Nations finals has provided out of favour Orlando Pirates striker Gabadinho Mhango the perfect opportunity to send reminders about his quality as a player.

This is the opinion of his former Malawi teammate Robert Ng’ambi.

From a difficult season in which he has managed just six appearances at Pirates and hogged the headlines for wrong reasons, Mhango struck a brace for The Flames against Zimbabwe in a famous Afcon finals win on Friday.

“This is definitely an opportunity for him to redeem himself and show those that were starting to have doubts in him,” Ng’ambi tells KickOff.com.

“It is good that this tournament has come at the right time for him as he has just renewed his contract with the club.

“He has not been playing at his club and if it had been another player, we couldn’t have been seeing a performance from him. Just check how many months he has been out of action at club level, but he is still able to deliver on the international stage. I think this is the time for him to realise that he is a good player, but he needs to stop with certain things this disturb him and focus on his career if he wants to go far,” says Ng’ambi.

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Mhango has had a horrible ride this season at Pirates without a goal to his name having totalled less than 150 minutes from the six appearances that he has made.

“At Pirates there has been a new coach, so the philosophy has changed, and the new coach hasn’t had that time to spend with him plus they also had another new striker coming in while Gaba wasn’t there. So, the Pirates coach might change his mind and be thinking about what he can do to get the best out of him to perform the way he has done with the national team.

“This is what the supporters also want to see week in week out so when he comes back, he needs to give his all-in football. It is all in his hands and he must decide how much he wants it to make a difference at his club. The eyes will now be on him after having seen what he has done at AFCON,” says Ng’ambi.