Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos insists he is satisfied with his rookies after Friday night’s 1-1 draw with 164th-ranked Andorra.
Broos handed debuts to attacking trio Elias Mokwana, Mlondi Mbanjwa and Patrick Maswanganyi and Orlando Pirates’ Cape-born defender Thapelo Xoki for the inaugural Fifa Series clash in Algeria at Annaba’s May 19 Stadium.
But their test soon got tougher after just five minutes, when goalkeeper Ricardo Goss in his third international appearance miscontrolled a backpass and Ricard Fernandez pounced to make it 1-0 to the Europeans.
However, Bafana did hit back after 25 minutes when debutant Mokwana’s effort with the outside of his boot was deflected into the goal.
That was as good as it got for SA, as Maswanganyi saw his shot soon after the break was saved.
Broos rued SA’s missed kanse, saying: “I think we [South Africa] showed again, shall I say the problem of South African football, we don’t have that scorer – the guy who gets one chance and scores a goal.
“If you see the six or seven chances we’ve had today and then we only scored once. In this game you always must win if you have more quality in front of the goal.”
“This is the only thing I’m not satisfied with.”
Ahead of tomorrow night’s meeting with continental giants Algeria, the Belgian says he is ready to give his players another chance to prove themselves.
He adds: “It was also the goal for us to give players that chance to have experience internationally.
“We saw today what I said before the game. This is a team that is very defensive and physical. They always look for the duels and play the man first, that is their style.
“It is very difficult to play a team like Andorra. They lose nearly every game but always only by one goal.
“That could have happened [in our match], we gave it [a goal] away easily, but after that, we had six or seven good chances to score.”
“I am satisfied, not with the result, though. We tried to win, but I am satisfied with the performance.
“I think these are players we can count on for the games in June and at the end of the year.”