Williams, Zwane, Tau the only Bafana players with Afcon experience

Bafana Bafana captain Ronwen Williams, clubmate Themba Zwane and Al Ahly forward Percy Tau have something in common in the squad selected by coach Hugo Broos to represent SA in the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon), which kicked off on Saturday in Ivory Coast.

The trio are the only ones with experience of representing Bafana in the Afcon — they were part of Stuart Baxter’s team that reached the quarterfinals in Egypt in 2019. This raises questions about the depth and readiness of Broos’s other 20 players who will be making their Afcon debuts in Ivory Coast.

But the 71-year-old Belgian, who won the 2017 Afcon with a Cameroon side similar in experience to the Bafana team, won’t mind a bit as it has always been his plan to refresh Bafana. 

The 34-year-old Zwane was initially not in Broos’s plans. The Bafana coach stated from the day he was appointed in May 2021 that he needed new blood in his team.

It was Zwane’s consistent displays for Mamelodi Sundowns that forced Broos to change his mind about him in September 2022 — more than a year after Broos’s tenure began. Broos went on to describe Zwane as the best player he has coached. In fact, he says the Sundowns playmaker doesn’t require much coaching as “he knows all he needs to do” when he’s on the field.

The Bafana coach praised Zwane after he inspired SA to a 4-0 victory in an international friendly against Sierra Leone in September in Zwane’s first Bafana match under Broos.

“I’m not a coach who makes special mention of some players, but what Themba Zwane did today was great. Maybe he was the missing link in our team, a guy who can keep the ball, a guy who can give passes and a guy who can score,” Broos said after that victory.

Broos will be counting on the experience of Zwane, Tau and Williams when Bafana open their Afcon account against Mali in Korhogo in Ivory Coast on Tuesday. The coach expects these players to guide their 20 teammates who have never set foot at an Afcon tournament.

A few Bafana players, such as Sundowns’ Teboho Mokoena, have accumulated international experience playing for SA’s junior national teams and their respective clubs in Caf’s interclub competitions. Their experience, combined with that of Tau, Zwane and Williams, should help a Bafana team that has already been written off by some.

Tuesday’s game against Mali will give some indication of how Broos’s team might fare against two other Group E opponents, Namibia on January 21 and Tunisia on January 24, the day Mokoena will be celebrating his 27th birthday.

If the results of Bafana’s previous 10 appearances at Afcon are anything to go by, there’s no reason to expect fireworks from Broos’s team in the first match.

The last time Bafana won their opening group match at Afcon was in 2004 in Tunisia when Siyabonga Nomvethe’s brace helped SA beat Benin 2-0. That victory was, however, not enough to help Bafana progress to the knockout round. Bafana lost 3-1 to Algeria and 1-0 to Ivory Coast in their first matches in their last two Afcon appearances in 2015 and 2019.

While Bafana managed to make it to the last 16 despite finishing third in their group in 2019, they were not so lucky with Shakes Mashaba in 2015 as the team never recovered from their loss against the Algerians.

Broos’s team will, however, do well to avoid the infamous record set by the late Ted Dumitru’s team in 2006 in Egypt. That was the worst Bafana side to represent SA at the finals as they lost all three of their group games against Guinea (2-0), Tunisia (2-0) and Zambia (1-0) to become the first Bafana side to fail to score a goal in an Afcon tournament.