From day one as naysayers had been writing Bafana Bafana obituaries even before the team boarded a flight to Ivory Coast, former defender Japie Motale was confident in Mzansi's chances.
As some of the doubters have since made U-turn on their negative comments about Hugo Broos' side, Motale is optimistic that a place in the Africa Cup of Nations final is a real possibility for the 1996 champions.
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Bafana progressed to the quarter-finals of the competition after defeating Morocco 2-0 on Tuesday courtesy of goals from Evidence Makgopa and Teboho Mokoena, as well as inspiring performance from the entire team and tactics of the high level from the Belgian mentor and his technical team.
"Like I said from the beginning, I have always believed in this team and to date nothing has changed from my end about that. The fact that there are so many players from Sundowns should have been a sign to everyone at home that we have sent a good team there. In football, if you have been winning, that can easily rub off to the others. It's like getting used to fighting against relegation, you can get the bad luck of that following you throughout, and that's football," said Motale, speaking exclusively to the Siya crew.
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"What is working for Bafana in this tournament is that they went there as underdogs and that is making them to feel under no pressure. I said it even after our first game which we lost that come the 11th of February Bafana will be playing in the final and people were saying I am fooling myself. People were saying that Bafana wouldn't make it past the group stages and that was their opinion, and I couldn't dispute that, but I was confident in my own way of seeing things," he said.
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