17 Apr 2023

Extension Gunners coach, Daniel ‘Chico Dance’ Nare knows the buttons to press to get the team firing again.

To set the black and white Lobatse outfit in traction to evade what looks like an inevitable and historic relegation lurking around Peleng grounds, The Dance (another moniker for coach Nare) will have to choreograph sleek moves out of jaws of monster relegation.

Speaking in a post-match interview after suffering a 0-2 loss at the hands of wasteful Nico United on Saturday at Sam Sono Stadium, Nare said he believed Gunners could be saved provided he kept pressing and activating the buttons known to him.

The first button Nare pressed was exposing to the world that one of the most famous teams, a big brand of yesteryear, was training with only two balls.

“When I said we had only two balls I knew which buttons I was pressing to get those balls.

Right now those balls are there. We’re training like a Premier League team,” Nare said, adding that there were other problems he would not divulge.

However, The Dance is committed to the cause of saving the famed Guna Guna as he did twice before, although the more than four decades long bragging claim, ‘we’ve never relegated’ is now seriously threatened.

Every loss Gunners suffer paves the way for ‘Dlala Tsatsantsa’ to drop down to the second tier football although Nare had a theory that he believed was shining light on their hopes.

“The teams above us falter every time we drop points and had we been chopping in some points we could be better off,” he said adding that he was receiving some massive support from management, supporters and the players.

“I don’t sleep.

I wake up and try this and that.

But for reasons that Gunners is where it is why these players like Dirang Moloi, Desire Bafana and Kobamelo Kebaikanye are not here,” said Nare, who promised to press another button to get the players back to training.

One would have expected The Dance to take a breather from football, especially that he had his sour relationship with Centre Chiefs pressed to a screeching stop.

However, Gunners are a family to The Dance.

Does he know where the bodies are buried? Nare said that when his former manager Rashid Chopdat came knocking at his door, aided by his crutches, he put away all that he had been occupying his head with to accept the offer.

Then, Nare would sit at home and wash his cars, feed his dogs and watch television in most instances.

“But it needed someone who knows the inside story of Gunners.

I know the problems there.

I know the troubles,” he said.

With only seven games left to rescue, Nare was hopeful the Gunners could be saved.

“Yes, there’s hope.

In relegation battle you keep fighting until the last minute.

The last minute will decide our fate,” he said.

The senior most player, although he sat on the bench against Nico, Katlego ‘Mathousand’ Mothibi cut a nervous fellow in a post-match interview.

In his 19 uninterrupted years with the Peleng boys, Mothibi has seen Gunners twice slip through the jaws of relegation to safety.

This time he was very nervous.

Having played for Guna Guna as a 19-year-old, Mathousand is ready to join in the fight to the end.

“It is a difficult situation right now, but we are not about to give up,” he said, adding that the team would survive if they could garner five straight wins from the remaining seven. A toll order.

Mothibi said all they had was hope and they lived to fight every day to save a team that had never relegated since joining the top tier league in 1980. ENDS