Banyana Banyana head coach Dr Desiree Ellis has applauded her charges for their fierce fight in booking their 2026 CAF Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) quarterfinal ticket.
The 2022 WAFCON champions narrowly beat a physically challenging Burkina Faso side 1-0 to finish second in Group B with four points after coming into the tie sitting rock bottom.
Thembi Kgatlana netted the only goal of the match in the first half with South Africa now just one win away from securing qualification to the 2027 Brazil FIFA Women’s World Cup.
They face hosts Morocco in Rabat tonight, a side they pipped 2-1 to the title four years ago.
Ellis was happy with how her charges kept the Burkinabe at bay to win the match and progress to the last eight.
“I said it was going to be a tough one, and we made it a little bit difficult for ourselves,” she said as per safa.net.
“We scored early and stopped playing. You’ve got to give credit to the players though; it wasn’t pretty and sometimes it doesn’t have to be pretty.
“Defensively we were organized and I think we had one or two chances that could have put the game to bed, but I thought the team played very well.
“It’s not how you start, but how you finish. The fightback shows what this team is made of, and we keep working on being better and that’s all we can do. Now the games are coming thick and fast, there’s no margin for error.
“We have also showed that we can grind out results. I think in 2018 we played probably the best football of the tournament and we didn’t win it. In 2022 we mixed it up, so we’ve learned that you can’t play pretty all the time and that’s what people expect from Banyana Banyana.
“But we will take it step by step and day by day.”
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