As it is now well-known, Bafana Bafana have been drawn with Nigeria, Benin, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Lesotho in Group C of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers.
Having already qualified Bafana for the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) finals to take place in the Ivory Coast next year, the job doesn't get any easier for Hugo Broos to prove himself as the capable head coach by taking the team to the biggest of all football tournaments in the world that is to be staged across Canada, Mexico and the United States.
The World Cup qualifiers draw was conducted in Ivory Coast on Thursday, with the games set to begin in November and up to October 2024.
Only the winners from the nine groups of the CAF-affiliated teams will qualify to join other nations from around the world to make up the 48 teams from six different confederations that will take part in the World Cup.
Former Mamelodi Sundowns defender and Mzansi football legend Lovers Mohlala is unconvinced with Bafana and how the current state of football in the country.
The Good
"Look, I do farming and when I know that I have to have good cattle and sheep I need to focus on the calves and lambs so as to prepare for the long run. If anybody wants to be serious about football in the country, we need to be serious about the development and that's why I make this example about cattle and sheep. That's why Sundowns has been successful, it's because there is proper development at the club. It's like in politics. You know in Africa, politicians are old people and therefore there are no young people coming through that are being developed. When you develop young people in life, you know that you will see progress. As long as we don't have proper development plan, there is no where that we are going in our football. You cannot keep selling all your cows without having the younger ones because you will end up running out of stock. What is our football philosophy as a country? When foreign people came to the country, they told us to change the way we were used to playing and started telling us about the long balls. Now we are seeing some countries playing tiki taka and doing well, which is something we were born with but we were told to change it and we allowed those who were telling us that. I think South Africa should grow and this thing of having 16 teams in a professional league in a country with a population of over 60 million doesn't make sense. There are so many good players that could be playing in the national team but are not getting the opportunities because there aren't enough clubs," said Mohlala.
The Bad
"People are celebrating that we have qualified for the AFCON. Have we qualified for the AFCON? How did we qualify? A group of three teams from which two would be going to the tournament and you celebrate that we qualified? That is a joke. It's not like we don't have good players, because we do have them, but there are a lot of them who retire playing in the ABC Motsepe League because of the lack of opportunities for them to make it out of that league," he said.
The Ugly
"If you look at Bafana Bafana, there is no hope because many players don't make it out of the ABC Motsepe League because of corruption in the league. When players qualify their clubs for the Motsepe Foundation Championship, you don't see them again. You last see them when they celebrate promotion and they disappear," added the outspoken legend.
"South Africa is just an average team"
"South Africa is just an average team. Yes, we may do well against the likes of Zimbabwe and Benin but the future doesn't look so great. The standard of football in Africa in general has dropped and even for countries like Nigeria. Nigeria used to be known for producing quality strikers but that doesn't happen anymore. I don't see Bafana Bafana making any progress in the World Cup qualifiers," concluded Mohlala.
What are the chances for Bafana in World Cup qualifiers?
