Bafana misfire yet again
Our top goal scorers in the Premier Soccer League all finished the season with a paltry 11 goals.
Being a Bafana Bafana supporter is hard.
They are perennially disappointing.
This past weekend, I, along with thousands of over soccer-loving South Africans suffered through 90 minutes of the most boring, tedious, frustrating match as I watched the home team struggle against Libya.
The match was a qualifier for the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations.
No matter what the home team tried, they just could not find the back of the net.
I think I would have preferred for Libya to beat us soundly than to watch that goalless draw.
After dropping points against Libya against expectations, the team will now be under more pressure next month when they take on Seychelles in back-to-back matches.
The islanders lost 1-5 to Libya and 0-3 to Nigeria last night.
Bafana shares the Group E summit with Libya on four points apiece after two fixtures.
It has become apparent to South Africans that the only way we will qualify for any tournament is if we’re hosting it.
What is scarier is that what happened on Saturday is nothing new.
We’re used to our misfiring soccer team, even against what appears to be weaker teams on paper.
Stuart Baxter, our coach plays in a very defensive manner and that only really works when you have strikers firing on all cylinders.
Anyone who watches South African football will know we don’t have any hot strikers.
Our top goal scorers in the Premier Soccer League all finished the season with a paltry 11 goals.
That’s certainly nothing to write home about.
If you ask the coach, however, why the team failed to secure all three points, Baxter says, “We weren’t really true to ourselves in the second half.”
Baxter goes on to say he thinks “it was a very good game of football and it was a good advert for African football.”
Excuse me?
Were we watching the same game?
If Baxter thinks that was a game of soccer, then no wonder the Moses Mabhida stadium was empty on Saturday.
The only person in the team who seemed to acknowledge how awful things were was stalwart midfielder Dean Furman who after the match said, “It’s too long now that we’ve been letting ourselves down, Bafana Bafana down, and the country down by not qualifying for major tournaments. Until we improve on that and take advantage of these kinds of games where we should be picking up three points, we’re going to cause ourselves problems going forward.”
I dread watching the game next month.
What compounded the frustration was the Springbok’s losing too.
There used to be a time when one could depend on the Boks to cheer us up with a win, but even they have become awful away from home.
Who will sports loving South Africans look to now for their win?
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