Cardoso explains why Saleng remains out in the cold at Sundowns

"I don't want to speak about that because Saleng is a club issue and not a coaching issue," Cardoso said. Mamelodi Sundowns coach Miguel Cardoso has reiterated that Monnapule Saleng’s ongoing exile is a club matter and not a coaching issue.Saleng has yet to feature for the Brazilians this season after being separated from the first team following disciplinary issues. The former Orlando Pirates winger failed to report for duty ahead of Sundowns’ pre-season trip to Austria, prompting the club to take a firm stance on his conduct. Cardoso revealed that the technical team had made several attempts to help Saleng integrate into the squad, but repeated incidents eventually made it difficult to rely on the player. “I don’t want to speak about that because Saleng is a club issue and not a coaching issue, it was never a coach issue. He was always a player we gave a lot of effort,” Cardoso reiterated. “We tried to push him so much towards the group, towards the dynamic of the group, towards the behaviours that a professional player has to have, the mental stability that a professional player has to have. “But inside the group we have no issues, we have a lot of understanding about what the rules are and our locker room has rules that establish those players that established a way to be, relate. “When a player systematically breaks these kinds of things towards the teammates, towards the coaches, towards the club, we don’t know what we can count on. So there is a moment where we say how can we count on something where you don’t know what he’s going to do?” Have Sundowns given up on Saleng? Cardoso said there were several occasions when Saleng’s behaviour left the technical team uncertain about whether they could count on him for matches. “Imagine you train all of the week normally and then you put his name on a list, and the day we’re waiting for him to get into the bus, he doesn’t appear,” he said. “So these things did not happen once, did not happen twice, three, four times. Being the last to arrive, the first to go away.” There have also been reports linking Saleng to off-field struggles, including alcohol abuse, although Cardoso stressed that the club is handling the matter internally. “We tried in the beginning of the season to give a lot of love. Our attitude towards him after he failed us was that let’s not tear him apart, but let’s embrace him and try to give him stability, love and let’s make him feel important,” the Sundowns coach said. “My assistant showed me a clip where I was dancing with him in the circle of the team where I was trying to make him understand exactly how we wanted him to integrate into the family. “But to be part of it you also really want to be in the dynamics of the family. This is the last time I’m going to speak about it because it is a club and no more a question for the coach.” Sundowns will turn their attention to the MTN8 on Sunday when they face Golden Arrows in the first leg of their semi-final at Lucas Moripe Stadium.