On a chilly Bloemfontein evening, South Africa’s Bafana Bafana turned on the heat to defeat Comoros 3-1 in their COSAFA Cup semi-final at Free State Stadium on Friday night.
The outcome means Bafana Bafana have advanced to Sunday’s final and will play defending champions Angola, who defeated Madagascar 4-1 in the other semi-final on Friday.
After the match, South Africa’s coach Vela Khumalo praised his team’s proactive strategy, emphasising the importance of setting the tone with an early goal.
Khumalo revealed that the team’s approach against Comoros was clear from the first whistle: get an early goal and set the tone.
The plan was to start with energy and intent, applying pressure and making sure South Africa didn’t leave anything to chance.
“We said we are going to play with two (number) 10s. We are going to play with one top man (striker), and we wanted to end the goal leaks so that we can unsettle them and open them up,” said Khumalo.
“If you look at the teams that we have been playing against, they sit back and then they catch us on set-plays and start a (counter-attack) situation.
“So, in this case, what we said was that let’s have a quick goal, let’s unsettle them, let’s play the ball behind them, but let’s draw them in because they were marking us tightly.
“Once we managed to draw them in, we attacked with our lone striker. It has worked for us, and I’m happy that we scored the goals that we needed this time around.”
With this victory, South Africa will face Angola, brimming with confidence from their performance against Comoros, as they set out to pursue the ultimate glory in front of their fans.
