COSAFA CUP DEFEAT

South Africa were recently knocked out of the Cosafa Cup by Zambia in a penalty shootout. After the match, South Africa manager Gordon Igesund stated that despite the loss his team at the better team in the match.

The match ended as a 0-0 draw after extra time. Hence, it needed penalties to bring out the winner between the two teams. Zambia came out of the lottery as the winners after a 5-3 score. Igesund made some significant changes to the starting line-up.

The team have just come on the back of a victory against Namibia, but the manager decided to freshen things up.
Igesund said after the match that he would like to congratulate Zambia, but he said that it never feels nice when a team is defeated on penalties. South Africa hit the post on two occasions during the match and they could have easily won it had they had more luck.

Despite an intimidating home crowd, South Africa’s problems were more down to finishing their opportunities according to the manager. The focus will now be shifting towards the World Cup qualifying. South Africa have an important World Cup qualifying match against Botswana coming up in September.
They will be preparing solely with the purpose of beating Botswana.

“I think it was a very good game of two teams having a go at each other. I would like to congratulate Zambia for the win, although it is never nice to lose on penalties. I thought we were better tonight and as you saw we hit the post twice. I am just disappointed for the boys because I would have loved to see them in the final because they gave their all. The crowd did not affect us because we stuck to our game plan and took the game to our opposition, it is just unfortunate we could not get the desired result,” said Igesund.