Kaizer Chiefs defender Patrick Mayo believes that he and his teammates will need to double their efforts in the coming games in order to ensure that they end off the season amongst the top eight finishers in the league, which will thereby qualify Chiefs for the SAA Supa 8 tournament next season and allow The Amakhosi the opportunity to defend the trophy they won earlier this season.

According to Mayo the team needs to focus their attention on winning at least three of their remaining four games, he believes that this can be achieved on condition that the players understand the importance of winning these remaining games.

Mayo told kaizerchiefs.com on Thursday that he was disappointed with his own performance in Chiefs 2-0 defeat to Black Leopards on Sunday, and that a number of players including himself need to do some serious sole searching ahead of next weeks game against Santos.

“I was upset at the way I played on Sunday and in particular in the manner in which I gave away possession which lead to Leopards first goal, I do feel that as a team we did not perform according to our usual high standards” said Mayo. The highly experienced Chiefs defender says that although he has conceded that he made an error against Leopards, he will not be letting it affect his preparations for Chiefs next game against Santos.

Mayo added “like I said I made a mistake against Leopards and I have learnt my lesson, instead of dwelling on the mistake I feel I will do myself a number of favours if I focus on putting up a better showing against Santos next week. It is not just me who feels that they were not up to scratch on Sunday, a number of the guys felt that they could have done better to ensure that we won the game”.

With four games to go Mayo who has turned out more than fifty times in league and cup games for Chiefs since joining The Amakhosi in 2003, feels that there can be no negotiating the fact that Chiefs need to bag the full compliment of points from their remaining four games of the season. As he explained “we need to lift our game for our remaining fixtures of the season and in particular the next two games as we should aim to win these games and cement our place in next seasons SAA Supa8 competition”. The Amakhosi face two teams in the next fortnight in the form of Santos and Pirates both of whom lay in joint eighth place on the league standings a point adrift of Chiefs.

Victory in these games will all but seal a place for Chiefs in next seasons Supa8 and Mayo feels that fighting for a top eight finish will bring the best out of The Amakhosi, “the entire team knows that they have to pull up their socks so to speak, to get into the Supa8 right now we have our backs to the wall. Believe me whenever we are under pressure we play at our best and right now only playing at our best will help pull us through and land us a top eight finish” added Mayo.

It will be a travesty of justice according to Mayo should Chiefs be unable to end the season with a top finish, as they would be unable to enter the fray and defend their SAA Supa8 crown. Patrick Mayo who has in the past two seasons put his best foot forward for Chiefs is looking towards finishing the season with a twelve points haul for Chiefs, as he feels that nothing less then a strong finish to the season will please him and the rest of the team.