One of the major changes he made at Orlando Pirates since his arrival in December for the second half of the season, Josef Zinnbauer improved the team’s defence considerably from what it was at the start of the campaign, as the team went on to finish third on the log and qualified for the CAF Confederation Cup.
Under the German mentor, Pirates didn't concede more than one goal in a match in the Absa Premiership, with the team’s number one goalkeeper Wayne Sandilands finishing the campaign with 12 clean sheets (eight under Zinnbauer) from 27 league matches, and was behind only SuperSport United’s Ronwen Williams by one clean sheet.
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When he was unveiled as Pirates coach, Zinnbauer found the club in 6th place on the log and having conceded a whopping 20 goals – four from the first two matches of the season under Milutin Sredojevic before his resignation and 16 under Rulani Mokwena from the 11 matches he was in charge of as caretaker coach – before he returned to Mamelodi Sundowns via Chippa United.
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Bucs have conceded only nine goals from 17 matches in the league under Zinnbauer have finished the campaign having conceded 29 goals.
The German coach has guided the team to 10 wins, five draws and two losses.
In the previous two seasons under Sredojevic and Mokwena as his assistant, Pirates conceded 26 goals in the 2017/18 and 24 in the 2018/19 seasons respectively.
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