Head coach of the Sasol-sponsored Banyana Banyana, Desiree Ellis, says she is impressed by recruit Faith Nokuthula.
The England-based midfielder cum defender has been called up into the South African Senior Women’s National Team as a replacement for the influential Refiloe Jane.
The Soweto-born Jane has been ruled out of the upcoming friendly international match against 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup co-hosts, Australia in London on Saturday, 8 October due to Visa application complications.
Ellis had a chance to assess Nokuthula up close at the squad’s training session.
The player, born in Ireland of South African parents, is on the books of Blackburn Rovers Ladies.
“There are some things that not many people know about Faith – she plays as a right fullback or right wing back. She played in the youth team of Brighton as a central midfielder, and we played her today in that position of right fullback and she looked very calm on the ball, her passing was good, so I was really impressed. It’s one session obviously but she showed the qualities, and we are really looking forward to seeing her tomorrow as well,” Ellis told www.safa.net
On Thursday (6 October 2022) Banyana Banyana had their first proper training session since their arrival on London on Wednesday – with a full complement of players in camp.
Ellis’ charges are still smarting from a disappointing defeat to Brazil in a friendly international last month, losing 3-0 and 6-0 in back-to-back fixtures.
“Everybody’s in camp and today’s training session was good. We worked on a few things that we need to be better at and I am really excited the players all looked sharp. We have one more session at the stadium and we are really looking forward to going there because we want to be better than what we were against Brazil. There’s a lot of things that we worked on in the short space of time, unfortunately we couldn’t work on everything,” said Ellis.
“But I think defensively we have got be a little bit more organized, we must make sure that we minimize our mistakes. We also need to be better in our decision making, we need to be better in the final third – when we get an opportunity, we need to take that because it’s been shown at this level that you miss an opportunity and in the next minute the balls in the back of your net. But we’re looking for an improved performance obviously compared to the showing against Brazil because we know we better than that.”
The South Africans will have their final training session on Friday before they tackle Australia the next day at Kingsmeadow Stadium in London.
By Matlhomola Morake
