07 Nov 2019

Veteran striker, Tebogo Sembowa struck a trinity of goals to hand Jwaneng Galaxy three valuable points against an equally determined Gaborone United (GU) during the two’s midweek meet in Jwaneng on November 6.

Sembowa struck as early as the 12th minute of the first half, after receiving a cross from the right flank by workhorse, Patrick Kaunda, and got his brace 10  minutes later from a rebound after GU keeper, Ookeditse Semelamela failed to tame a shot by Atisang Batsi from the left wing, to give his team a 2-0 lead into recess.

Four minutes after the break, he completed his hat-trick from another Kaunda assist after a good build-up by Galaxy.

Gilbert Baruti started the move by releasing a through pass just outside the area to Kaunda on the far right.

Kaunda then found Sembowa, who nodded home, although many believe that Semelamela could have done better to thwart the effort.

GU had to wait for 55 minutes to get a consolation goal through Thatayaone Kgamanyane, and the goal seemed to spur GU a bit as they created a number of chances.

Kgamanyane nearly got his brace in the dying minutes of the game after curling towards goal from a Lobopo Moremi pass, but Galaxy keeper, Anthony Gouws produced an equally outstanding save, although it led to him playing the last minutes with an injury after landing on his right arm, leaving the field in an arm band after the game.

Galaxy’s performance seemingly indicated that they have hit a rich vein of form.

After going for four home games without a win, Galaxy started breaking the home jinx against Gilport Lions last weekend and against GU, many were left wondering why the team has been playing so poorly at home.

However, one man was always confident that such good times will come.

“I have always said that we are not bad in terms of the overall play, and that we only needed to start scoring goals and all will fall into place.

We have started scoring and things are looking good.

It was just a matter of time,” said Galaxy coach, Miguel Da Costa after the game. Da Costa said that what they now need to do is ensure that they play well both home and away.

“I agree that our home record was not that good of recent.

We have so far won all our away games, and now that we have started winning home as well, we have to make sure we keep it that way,” he said.

He said that the victory against GU was also sweet in the fact that it came against a good team.

For his part, GU coach, Nikola Kavazovic said that despite the loss, he was happy with the play by his team.

“We lost to a good team, which in my opinion is the best team in the league so far and first candidate for the championship.

Our main undoing was mostly because we arrived for the game very late.

We left Gaborone at around 3:30pm and only had time for a light warm-up before we started the game, and that’s the reason for us conceding early,” he said.

Kavazovic said then after that, Galaxy’s’ experience decided the game. “After going two goals up, they defended the lead well and didn’t allow us to control the game, so credit to them,” he said.

Kavazovic said they will have to go back and prepare for Galaxy as the two will soon meet in the quarter finals of the Mascom Top 8. ENDS