The story behind the scenes

No time for friendly matches?

Soccer Laduma understands that it will be difficult for SAFA to secure friendly matches for the national team before the start of the tournament due to there being so little time. Depending on when they travel to Ivory Coast, Bafana could get one friendly game to prepare, or at most two, if the mother body are able to get things done in a short space of time. Broos, however, would still want his players to get sufficient rest before the showpiece and would not want there to be any injuries to disrupt his preparations. It’s proving to be a challenge for the coach.

Sundowns players are the big worry

A big part of the Belgian’s squad is made up of Sundowns players and they are still going to go through a hectic period before the final encounter of the year on December 30. As things stand, the Chloorkop-based side have four games in hand to secondplaced SuperSport, so they are going to start playing catch-up in the league. The CAF Champions League group stage is due to start next weekend and will be played until December 20, just before Christmas. The likes of Ronwen William, Teboho Mokoena, Mothobi Mvala, Themba Zwane, Grant Kekana, Thapelo Maseko and Aubrey Modiba are players Broos is most likely to have in his final squad, but the challenge will be the amount of matches they have played and whether or not they are able to avoid injury between now and then. Already Broos has been dealt a blow with Kekana and Maseko having to be withdrawn from the current squad that’s set to play Benin and Rwanda in crucial World Cup qualifiers.

Can Broos use this as an excuse?

Despite all the challenges Broos is facing with regards to the PSL and its fixtures, there will still be high expectations from the public to perform well at Afcon, especially because the Belgian comes with the reputation of having led Cameroon to a title in the past. The challenge for the 71-year-old is having to perform miracles with a squad that might not be as fresh as he would like.