SOUTH Africa have often pretty much taken care of their own business in their Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) campaign, but on Tuesday evening, they would need one big favour from particularly, Cote d’Ivoire as they wrap their Group B campaign.
Unless they are able to win big against Burkina Faso in the final group game, their 2026 campaign will be over and their dream of earning a second successive Women’s World Cup (WWC) berth for the will be dashed.
However, a win by itself will not be enough and that is where Bayana Bayana, champions in 2022, will need a favour from Cote d’Ivoire who face Tanzania in the other group encounter.
Currently last in the group, with just a point and one goal deficit, South Africa will have to win and in doing so, score more goals to have a realistic change of surviving.
While attempting to beat Burkina Faso, who have three points and minus two goals, South Africa will be hoping that the Ivorians, who lead the group with four points, will either beat the Tanzanians or at least hold them to draw.
Unfortunately, for Coach Desiree Ellis and her ladies, all sides have a realistic change of qualifying and will thus be all out for that extra push to sneak through to the quarter-finals.
Before the start of the competition, South Africa, who have been consistent at this tournament and tipped to be among the final four, have had a bad campaign in Morocco, the same venue they made history with their first WAFCON title in 2022 and now have an early exit staring them in the face, the first time since 2004 that they exited the competition at the group stage.
This bad dream began in the opening game when against the odds, they were shocked 1-2 by Tanzania in their opening game and then managed to earn a point against Cote d’Ivoire with a 2-2 draw in the second.
Against Burkina Faso, the South Africans must dig deep, hoping that their star players will finally shine, especially, their star player in 2018 and 2022, Chrestinah Thembi Kgatlana who has been a pale shadow of herself at this tournament.
Importantly, they will have to keep a tighter defense and avoid being the first to concede as in their previous games, they went down before fighting hard to get back into the game.
Anything short of a victory will signal the end of their journey at this year’s tournament and a sad end to the beautiful story Coach Ellis and the team have scripted since 2016.
