Banyana’s best yet – Van Wyk

Tshepo Ntsoelengoe

Their performance against Malawi earlier this week was their best of the group stages in the Cosafa Women’s Championship, according to Banyana Banyana captain Janine van Wyk (above).

Banyana thrashed Malawi 6-0 in Port Elizabeth on Monday, with Van Wyk making her record 150th appearance for the national team.

“It was a really good day for us. We came out with a lot of confidence and we had such great support coming into the stadium,” Van Wyk said.

“We had a slow start to the tournament, but we really needed to put some goals away and that is exactly what we did. We did so much better than we did in the past two games.”

The 31-year-old defender, who made her debut for Banyana back in 2005, was pleased with her milestone achievement but revealed that she was nervous in the first few minutes of the match.

“It was my first game with the team since the Cyprus Women’s Cup (in March) so I really needed to put up a good performance and show how far I have come with the team and how long I served the nation,” she said.

“I am just extremely happy with the result. We didn’t concede any goals so we need to take that forward with us to our next game.

“We came in with a lot of confidence and knew we needed to perform better, keep the ball on the ground and play our style of football.

“We have so much talent, flexibility and mobility in our team, so we needed to use that.”

Banyana, who finished top of their group in defence of their Cosafa title, are scheduled to take on Uganda in the semifinals tomorrow.