South Africa U17s open their 2024 TotalEnergies CAF U17 AFCON COSAFA qualifiers in Group C against Botswana at UJ Stadium on Thursday afternoon with coach Vela Khumalo confident of winning the tournament.
Amajimbos are in the same group as Comoros and Mauritius as well. Ahead of the opening fixture, Khumalo says his team has done enough in preparation and also trusts in the players selected to do the job.
The top three sides from the groups plus the best runner-up up will go to the knockout phase of the competition and the finalists will go to the U17 AFCON.
Though he knows how Botswana plays and has a plan for how to break them down, Khumalo is not going to undermine anyone as the bigger picture is to qualify for next year’s AFCON in Ivory Coast where they will possibly qualify for the World Cup.
“We are this nation that wants to win and we want to dominate and we want to win in style,” he said on Cosafa TV.
“And we really want to go to AFCON which will be our second step but as to how Botswana plays we’ll see them as they come but we anticipate all of that. We know they play from the second ball because technically they may not be as gifted as us.
“So we will force things, we will force them to play out of their comfort zone and see how it works but ultimately this is given to us. We must win this and go to the next level.
“Every coach when it comes to a tournament doesn’t want to say if and I’m sure with the preparation that we had we’ll go to the AFCON and we want to do well that side and we want to at least go to the World Cup.
“But like I said let’s start with the first thing first, qualify for COSAFA then later on go to the World Cup or something like that but it’s possible. It goes with the talent that we have identified, with the players that we have identified here it will be up to them to take us there.”
