South Africa coach Gordon Igesund says Bafana would have loved to win the 2013 COSAFA Cup which was scooped by hosts Zambia.
Igesund’s depleted Bafana squad settled for Bronze after beating Lesotho 2-1 in the Third and Fourth play-off match at Levy Mwanawasa Stadium in Ndola on Saturday.
The charismatic coach said the non availability of his key players at the regional tournament was a blow to South Africa.
Kaiser Chiefs, Orlando Pirates and SuperSport United declined to release their Bafana stars for the COSAFA Cup.
“We would have obviously liked to win the tournament, we changed the team so many times prior to tournament. Today I had nine players on the field all under 23,” he lamented.
Igesund further saluted the general organisation of the 2013 COSAFA Cup.
“It has been a nice tournament. First of all, I want to thank the Zambian people for the wonderful receiption and kindness they showed to us,” he said.
Bafana lost to Zambia 5-3 on penalties at the semi-final stage.
Too late
Iwe naiweSaulosi..
Igesund should not beret himself too much for not getting to the finals. Losing to Zambia and at penalties is a honourable exist. They even went on to win bronze by beating Lesotho..a good consolation. As for the limited pool of players he had to choose from again that should not be such a big deal as competitions such as the COSAFA are traditionally used to discover new talent and help the younger and less exposed players build their profile and experience. I stand to be corrected but I believe even Zambia’s winning team was very far from what one would call Zambia’s first squad. A lot of the players when new. It is also warming and refreshing to hear Igesund’s positive comments about the general organisation of the competition. I wish someone will provide some detail on what was so…
Igesund talks too much without any glory for his Bafana team, he is always organising his team in the event of any defeat and always on the drawing board whilst other coaches are competing. He lost AFCON(In his backyard), MANDELA CHALLENGE, Brazil 2014 qualifiers to little ethiopia, AND NOW COSAFA ohhhh…what else does SAFA want to warrant his exit.
The problem South Africa has from time of their Independence in as far as Soccer is concerned, is under rating the rest of Africa in football prowess. Despite disastrous consequences, this attitude has stayed with the Bafana Bafana and their supporters.
They have the richest league in Africa (7th richest in the World if I’m not mistaken), have engaged the best coaches from as far as Brazil, have the best facilities, have some players that play in the EPL because of favor and good contact and so on.
But there’s something they don’t have; natural talent for the game of soccer. As long as they aren’t willing to learn from countries like Congo, Zambia and West Africa, countries like Lesotho and Bostwana will soon catch up with them, they are the same people and have the same style…
They dont have natural soccer players. most of them nimakula or what we say maplanga. They can have facilities, money and so on but talent yebve balibe. Maybe its true mulungu sapasa vonse.
Bwana just come back to Jozi and pray for Mandela to die quickly.
As long as Mandela is alive, Bafana will always be kissing dust.
South Africa didn’t settle for bronze. They settled for copper