Banyana know where to from here
Team wants more practice time
Safa has yet to officially unveil the new Banyana Banyana coach but the team’s triumph at the Cosafa Women’s Championship has set a proper base for coach Desiree Ellis’s successor to start.
The SA senior women’s team is more often thought of as a work in progress, but the way they lifted the Cosafa cup at the weekend has brought to the fore some pointers that could be used going forward.
With the African Women’s Championship qualifiers coming up next year, Banyana should be ready to go even one better and get one of the three spots to the World Cup in France in 2019.
Ellis, who has been in charge for 13 months, said: “In this tournament we have learnt to win games even in hopeless situations. Winning this tournament has shown that if we get more game time and get together more often, the sky is the limit for us.”
A case in point was how the team overturned a 3-0 deficit against favourites Zambia to win the tense semifinal 5-3 on penalties. Banyana also bounced back from a goal down in the group stages against Botswana to earn a crucial point that saw them advance as group winners.
“Our fitness was superb. And we look back at the rotation where we were lambasted for making those [many] changes. In the end it all proved a wise decision because we had our best players looking fresher and better,” said Ellis, who handed debuts to six players.
Going forward, Ellis emphasised the utilisation of the Fifa international dates. “Most of the earlier part of the [Cosafa] tournament – we lacked cohesion because of a lack of game time … So it is important that we play regularly as Banyana to be able to see if you select players, can they raise the standard and play at international level.”
Cosafa player of the tournament Thembi Kgatlana also sees the bigger picture. “We need more training camps going forward and not just one camp before a tournament. This will help the team to know each other more.”
Leandra Smeda concurred: “We have a lot of quality for the [incoming] coach to select from, especially for next year to build the team for the African Women’s Championship – we need a team to compete strongly with the likes of Nigeria and Cameroon.”
Hopefully, Safa will retain Ellis in some technical capacity for the sake of continuity.