Ephraim “Shakes” Mashaba believes Bafana Bafana could have won by 14-0 in their qualifier match against Mauritius over the weekend. However, the 3-0 win was good enough going into the second leg tie.
Bafana gave a world class performance against their opponents, despite having only trained once to prepare for the encounter.
This comes after Mashaba was forced to quickly assemble an 18-man squad, following a massive withdrawal of players whom their PSL teams opted not to release for this Chan qualifier match against the Indian Ocean Islanders.
Mashaba, however, said he was pleased with how his charges performed on the day, given the little amount of time they had to prepare for the encounter.
“We played well in this match,” Mashaba said.
“The boys performed tremendously well. We created close to 14 scoring chances. Had we converted all of them, I think our scoring problems would have been resolved, but we are happy with the three goals we’ve scored.
“I believe they will give us the needed advantage going into the second leg tie in a fortnight’s time.
“We started the game on a high note. They attacked us three or four times in the first half.
“They tried using long balls to penetrate our line of defence, but we were solid at the back to deny them those scoring chances.
“They didn’t worry us much except for the mistakes we made in dangerous areas – where we gave the ball away.”
Mashaba, however, was not pleased with a number of chances his charges failed to convert in the second half, following a brilliant showing in the first.
Thamsanqa Gabuza’s goal and a brace from Siphelele Ntshangase were enough to see Bafana produce a solid lead going into the second half.
“We went to sleep a little bit in the second half,” he said.
“We were not the same team who performed in the first half, though we created many chances to score. They (Mauritius) adopted this robust kind of play which resulted in one of their players (David L’enclume) eventually getting a red card.
“But that’s football. It’s a contact sport and you can’t say much about it.
“With that said, I’m happy with the performance, given the fact that some of our players arrived some three days back in camp to prepare for this clash.”
Meanwhile, Mauritius coach Alian Marcel Paul Happe said his side will need to up their game in their second meeting with Bafana if they want to bounce back from the 3-0 deficit.
Happe believes that his charges will do just that in front of their home crowd.
“We struggled throughout this encounter but we believe that we’ve learned from our mistakes,” Happe said.
“You need to play against good teams in order to learn from them and the experiences.
“We’ve learned from our mistakes from this encounter. And we now need to sit down and look at what is it that we need to improve on, going into the second leg tie.
“Bouncing back from a 3-0 deficit is always a big task for any team to overcome.
“But with football you never know.
“It will be difficult but we hope that our supporters will serve as impetus for the boys to do well.” - The Mercury