Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos hailed Man of the Match Ronwen Williams after his four penalty saves against Cape Verde but also admitted it was his side’s “worst game of the tournament”.
South Africa qualified for the semi-finals of the Africa Cup of Nations for the first time in 24 years after eliminating the Blue Sharks on spot-kicks, with Williams saving an incredible four penaltues.
He became the first keeper in AFCON history to save four penalties in a shootout and also kept a fourth clean sheet, equalling Andre Arendse’s record from 1996.
“Let’s say six hours ago I was 71, now I’m 75,” Broos said after the match.
“It was a stressful game, certainly the penalties. You know what happens when you have to take penalties, it’s a very special situation for the players.
“Sometimes you do a little game after training, taking penalties and nearly no player misses a penalty but you see today what happened, not only with us but also the players from Cape Verde.
“That means, we can be happy, but players want to get a penalty. We were, not lucky because we had a very good keeper today. If you can save four penalties, this is not luck anymore. You can save one, but four, this is not luck.
“He did not only that, he saved us two minutes before the end with a player that was alone infront of him. Yes, he was of the match. I think we could choose nobody else, because he is really Man of the Match.”
Broos, though, also admitted that it wasn’t a great display by his team, saying the pressure may have gotten to some of his players.
“Our match was not so good, I think we played the worst game of the tournament of all our games. We played better against Mali, we played better against Namibia, Tunisia, also Morocco,” he added.
“Today, this was not the team we saw in the previous week. I think for some players it’s a very new experience, and maybe the pressure and the nerves played a role today in the game.
“For Cape Verde it was maybe different, they had nothing to lose. Even I think they are very sad now, but for us there was more to lose. And that was in the heads of the players and therefor we didn’t play like we used to do.
“But ok, I said it already it’s not the way you win [that matters], it’s you win and we won today with penalties. So we are very happy.”
Bafana will now face Nigeria in the semi-final on Wednesday.
