1 November 2024 – Coach Maud Khumalo’s youthful charges have very little time to relax after playing a semifinal on Thursday and they now face a quick turnaround to another tricky assignment when they tackle Zambia in the final of the COSAFA Women’s Championship on Saturday.
South Africa beat Mozambique 4-1 on penalties on Thursday and they now turn their attention to the tough Zambians in the tournament final at Isaac Wolfson Stadium tomorrow. Kickoff is at 15h00. Khumalo insisted that her youthful charges will be able to manage even with the quick turnaround time between the two matches.
“It is a quick turnaround because we could have had the final on Sunday to give the players more time to recover. But we need to manage the situation,” she said. “We are in the final and we will see how we manage the game. Also, we have other players on the bench we haven’t played, so we are going to manage the game and see how far we can go in the final.”
The Sasol-sponsored South Africans had to come back from a goal down and then keep their nerve during an equally tense penalty shootout after the match had finished 1-1 in regulation time.
Khumalo said while the match against the Mozambicans was difficult and the visitors gave her side a lot to think about, she was impressed by the character shown by her players.
“How we played was not pleasing but the character was there as after Mozambique scored first, we managed to get the equaliser. It’s more of players needing to stay calm, and they also need to understand that the knockout stage is completely different from the group stages.”
Captain Thalea Smidt said they have come a long way since their first match of the tournament against Namibia almost two weeks ago. “We have come a long way, just for the duration that we have been here (in Gqeberha),” she said. “Obviously progressing from the group stages and coming into the knockout stages has been a totally different ball game. We know that it’s a knockout game, so teams come and leave everything out there and you only have one chance. So, I think we have progressed well from the group stages to where we are now”.
