Broos happy Bafana ‘have some big guys now’, to face physical Cranes

Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos is confident his team will start their 2025 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) campaign with victory over Uganda at Orlando Stadium on Friday.

South Sudan, whom Bafana meet away in Juba on Tuesday and Democratic Republic of the Congo, whom the South Africans play home and away in October, complete Group K.

Broos warned against taking the Cranes lightly, saying they were a team likely to gain confidence and take their chances if they see complacency in their opponents.

“We have to keep ourselves on a certain line,” the experienced Belgian said of the need for this year’s Afcon bronze medallists in Ivory Coast to keep grounded and continue grinding out positive results. 

Bafana are the highest-ranked (57th in the world, 10th in Africa) team in the group and the only side that qualified for the most recent Afcon. Uganda, ranked 94th, will be desperate to qualify for Morocco after missing out on 2024 in Ivory Coast.

DRC are ranked 118th and South Sudan 169th.

“It’s a team that plays with dedication. They’re runners. In all the games I’ve seen, it’s a difficult team to play against. They want to play and they want to be tough,” said Broos, who has declared respect for Uganda’s coach, fellow Belgian Paul Put.

“On the other side, I saw things where we have to manage them in defence, but certainly also when we have the ball. If we can do that we can win the game.

“Because … if we can play good football like we’ve played in recent games and win, [then] I’m happy. But I will be [more] happy to show the right mentality. If we don’t have the right mentality tomorrow, it will be very difficult.”

One of the aspects Broos is pleased with in his team is the uncharacteristic physicality, size and height of some of his players, something he said was critical against teams such as Uganda who usually have tall, tough players.

“When I started coaching Bafana we had some problems in some games because we didn’t have the height in our team, we didn’t have the power. We looked for it and we found it.

“Grant [Johnson], our goalkeeper coach, was saying the other day, ‘Hey we have a big team now’. 

“It’s true we have some big guys there and you need that. It’s not enough that you can play football when you don’t have the physical qualities.

“We have guys like [Sphephelo] Sithole, [Rushwin] Dortley and [Siyabonga] Ngezana. We’re there where we need to be and we need them tomorrow in that game against Uganda because they have several guys with that height.”

The Bafana coach has a big decision to make at goalkeeper. With captain Ronwen Williams injured, AmaZulu’s Veli Mothwa, Ricardo Goss of SuperSport United and Sipho Chaine of Orlando Pirates will fight for the place between the posts.

Broos would not be drawn into saying who he has chosen.