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Gallo Images<\/p>\n
Teko Modise practises at a Bafana Bafana training session at Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban yesterday in preparation for their friendly against Senegal today. \tPicture: Gallo Images<\/p>\n
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The road to Brazil 2014 begins tonight at the Moses Mabhida Stadium when SA face Senegal in their last scheduled international friendly before the World Cup qualifiers start in June. <\/p>\n
After the rule book disaster that saw Bafana Bafana fail to qualify for last month\u2019s African Nations Cup in Equatorial Guinea and Gabon, coach Pitso Mosimane and his team will be desperate to enjoy that winning feeling again. Seven games have passed without a win. In that time Bafana drew against Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone and eventual African champions Zambia. <\/p>\n
Despite some positive performances in those outings, Mosimane said it was about time they started to win in order to rebuild self-belief and regain the public\u2019s support, especially because this will be the last opportunity for the squad to gather before the first World Cup qualifier against Ethiopia in June. <\/p>\n
The timing of the clash is awkward in that some of the nine Europe-based players arrived on Monday, and three of them joined the squad yesterday. Travel delays meant that the Belgium-based trio of Anele Ngcongca, Siboniso Gaxa and Daylon Claasen reached Durban yesterday afternoon, in time for only one training session. <\/p>\n
SA are still in a better position than the visitors. The majority of the squad is home-based, whereas the Senegalese are from Europe and touched down in Durban on a chartered flight later than their hosts. The Teranga Lions were set to hold their first training run at the match venue last night. In terms of experience and consistency SA have the edge. Senegal lost all their matches at the Nations Cup and are rebuilding under a new technical staff with more new faces than SA. Psychologically, too, SA hold an advantage. Bafana are ranked 10th on the continent, whereas Senegal slipped from fourth before Afcon to 16th. <\/p>\n
In midfield, the hosts are likely to include captain Steven Pienaar, Kagiso Dikgacoi, Thanduyise Khuboni and Teko Modise. <\/p>\n
Senegal\u2019s rebuilding phase didn\u2019t mean they would be push-overs, said defender Morgan Gould. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe shouldn\u2019t take them lightly. They\u2019re still a powerhouse. They didn\u2019t do well at Afcon so they will want to do well. They are wounded lions who will come with guns blazing, so we\u2019ve got to be on our toes to stop them scoring. There\u2019s also a bit of transition for our new players to adjust to, but we\u2019ll do what we\u2019ve got to do,\u201d said Gould. <\/p>\n
He was referring to recent recruits, midfielders Thamsanqa Sangweni and May Mahlangu, and strikers Siyabonga Nontshinga and Edward Manqele. Although he\u2019s already a hit in Sweden where he won the league and several player awards last season, Mahlangu is not taking his elevation to the national set-up for granted. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m still growing as a player. The competition is very tough and I need to work hard. There are very good players in midfield so I have to fight for my position. I don\u2019t think about what I\u2019ve done in Sweden. I think about what I\u2019m going to do now. This is about the nation and I hope to do well,\u201d said the 22-year-old central midfielder. <\/p>\n
In contrast, Senegal have brought only nine players from their forgetful Afcon campaign and could lack cohesion. According to Maritzburg United\u2019s Senegalese defender Mor Diouf, at least three players are uncapped and many others are being promoted from the junior national squads. Kick-off is at 8.35pm. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Gallo Images Teko Modise practises at a Bafana Bafana training session at Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban yesterday in preparation for their friendly against Senegal today. Picture: Gallo Images The road to Brazil 2014 begins tonight at the Moses Mabhida Stadium when SA face Senegal in their last scheduled international friendly before the World Cup […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-8471","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8471"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8471\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}