South African national team manager Ephraim Mashaba promised some key changes to the national team squad for the upcoming Cosafa Cup in Namibia.
This will be the precursor to the 2018 World Cup qualifying games for the South African national team. Hence,Mashaba has hinted that he may use this tournament as a preparation for the qualification campaign that starts in September. South Africa may be one of the strongest teams going into theCosafa Cup, but the big prize that awaits them is the World Cup. After having featured in the 2010 edition when they were the hosts, South Africa will want to experience the joy once again.
The national team has been on an extremely good run in the last few months. They have suffered just the one loss against Angola in the last eight games of all competitions. This, however, does make them look like proper contenders for the African Cup of Nations, which begins in 2017. Only the games against Gambia and Mauritania remain for the national team, who are winless so far. South Africa have drawn all their three games to sit third in the table. Only the top two teams from the group can take part in the African Cup of Nations.
“After long deliberations with the other coaches regarding the Cosafa Cup, we came to the conclusion that we must use this tournament to build our future teams.Many a time we as national team coaches always talk about how little time we have with the players ahead of a big game and how we didn’t have enough time to prepare but now we have ample time to do that. The 2016 squad for the Cosafa Cup is mainly made up of u23 players,” said Mashaba. TheCosafa Cup starts on June 11 and ends on 25th.