The Sasol-sponsored Banyana Banyana have lost their third match in a row since lifting the 2022 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) trophy in Morocco in July.
The South Africans couldn’t contain the Brazilian counterparts in two international friendly matches, losing 3-0 and 6-0 last month, before losing 1-4 to the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup co-hosts Australia on Saturday (8 October) at the Kingsmeadow Stadium in London.
Goals from Cortnee Vine (5’, 24’), Clare Polkinghome (41’) and Caitlin Foord (52’) were enough to give the Matildas a comfortable 4-1 victory after Hilda Magaia (86’) had grabbed the consolation goal for Desiree Ellis’ charges.
South Africa was without 10 regulars who were part of the squad that won the WAFCON – Refiloe Jane, Janine van Wyk, Andile Dlamini, Noko Matlou, Lebohang Ramalepe, Kaylin Swart, Noxolo Cesane, Kholosa Biyana, Thembi Kgatlana and Nomvula Kgoale.
The three fixtures were part of Banyana Banyana’s preparations for the FIFA Women’s World Cup next year – and these were the last on the schedule for 2022, with more high-profile games planned for 2023.
Next on Ellis’ plate is the draw that will take place on October 22 in Auckland, New Zealand.
At a post-match press-conference after the Australia clash, the former Banyana Banyana captain had this to say:
Your thoughts on the match:
I thought we didn’t start well, we conceded very early. We had spoken about minimizing the mistakes but once again we conceded from our mistakes. At times we were good on the ball but were not consistent. We played in patches and did track back, we tried to rectify that the second half so we have a lot of positives. I believe it was a better performance where we got test some really new players that came through and I thought they raised their hands – so a lot of positives to take away, including scoring a goal.
Any positives from this match?
Scoring a goal is not the only positive – players like Fikile, Thato, Tiisetso came after a long while, Bongeka played in unfamiliar role of DM -those are the positives, Regirl got her second start in the national team, I thought we were not as jittery in defence as we were against Brazil. Linda was more on the ball, but mistakes were there but all could be better.
Look this is a process, we played three games in two international windows and will continuously work to be better, the World Cup is not tomorrow but we feel it was a better performance than against Brazil, we just need to minimize our mistakes because they cost us again.
Would things be different if there was a professional league in South Africa – Brazil and Australia were just too powerful for us?
Absolutely, the professional league can close the gap. But playing Saturday and Wednesday certainly does not help because there is no time to prepare for the next game, you are always doing recovery and must travel – so that doesn’t help either when playing against the best in the game. Having a professional league will certainly help in a sense that right now a lot of the players have 9-5 jobs and must go to training afterwards, that is why some clubs train two or three times a week. On the other hand, we also try to assist by giving programs to the players to train on their own, so yes having a professional league will definitely raise the standards.
How important is it to play these top countries?
We wanted to play the best countries early on so we can be able to know what to work on because if you play them closer to the world cup and you haven’t prepared then you in for a shock. We have obviously played and we will look at who we want to play next and it may teams that are ranked closer to us so we can see what we learnt in the last three games so can put that into practice so that is what we are looking for going forward because you also have to build a little more of confidence to players, like Jermaine said it was rough and tough losing, but we have to play those teams to still see what we have learnt and maybe towards the end get teams are higher ranked than us
Do you feel this was an improved performance by your side?
Most definitely! You know we just spoke about things that happened in the first half and how we needed to do better. As I said, at times we gave the ball away when there was no pleasure we panicked unnecessarily, and a lot of communication on the field needed to happen as well because the players are sometimes not aware of who is around them. I felt also defensively we were a lot better, the (Australian) goalkeeper was tested a lot more so that’s a good positive for us. It was a better second-half performance and of course getign a goal put a smile on their faces. We were looking for an improved performance, yes it’s not where we want to be but it’s a step by step process and I felt it was improved performance.
Source: SAFA.net
