Banyana Banyana head coach Dr Desiree Ellis is targeting a return to winning ways after their 2026 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations opening defeat to Tanzania.
The 2022 WAFCON champions narrowly went down 2-1 to the Twigga Stars in their opening match of Group B at the Moulay Rachid Stadium on Monday.
Tanzania opened the scoring in the 31st minute through Diana Msewa before Bambanane Mbane levelled matters on the stroke halftime.
The East Africans then snatched a late win with five minutes remaining on the clock for the huge upset victory.
Ellis is now rallying her troops to bounce back from the defeat, admitting that they were left to rue their missed chances while Tanzania took theirs.
“Goals win games, we knew what Tanzania was going to do, but the two goals we conceded were poor,” she said according to safa.net.
“They had two chances and they scored them and won the game. I said before the match that it was going to be a very difficult match, but we also made life difficult for ourselves.
“I felt that all three games were going to be difficult, but a good start would have given us the momentum and now the next match becomes a final before the final, it’s a must-win, and also the game after that.
“We still have it in us, it wasn’t a good day at the office, we can be better than that. We cannot drop any more points and with only two teams progressing to the next round, we have to put our best foot forward.
“We knew that we had it in us to get positive results, and for that we are disappointed.”
Banyana next take on Ivory Coast on Friday, 31 July, who thumped Burkina Faso 4-1 in the other group fixture.
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