South Africa punished for insulting Zimbabwe, lose to Rwanda

21/11/2023

2 minutes read

Bafana Bafana returned to action on Tuesday afternoon when they faced Rwanda in a crucial 2026 FIFA World Cup qualification clash. Photo: BafanaBafana/SAFA/Facebook/Twitter

Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos’ sentiments that Zimbabwe should be banned from participating in the ongoing World Cup qualification matches seem to have backfired as his team suffered a 2-0 defeat to the country hosting Zimbabwe’s matches after the country’s stadiums were deemed unfit to hold any professional matches.

Rwanda defeats South Africa

The match turned out to be one to forget for Hugo Broos’ men as they went down 2-0 at the Huye Stadium.

Rwanda scored goals through Innocent Nshuti (12th minute) and Gilbert Mugisha (28th minute).

Bafana Bafana are ranked 12th in Africa and 64th in the world in the latest FIFA rankings.

Rwanda are 28th in Africa and 140th in the world.

Bafana Bafana was coming off a 2-1 victory over Benin in their opening match at the Moses Mabhida Stadium last Saturday.

Hugo Broos calls for Zimbabwe’s ban from WC qualifiers

Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos says CAF should ban teams like Zimbabwe who can’t host games at home due to unavailability of suitable football venues in their countries.

The Warriors were among seventeen sides that were forced to play on neutral venues in the 2026 World Cup Qualifiers.

The national team used Huye Stadium in Butare, Rwanda to host their home Ground C encounter against Nigeria on Sunday.

According to coach Hugo Broos, the best way to solve this stadium crisis is to block these countries with no suitable venues from playing in the qualifiers.

“This one thing I don’t understand in African football is that home games are not home games,” said Broos, as cited by IDiski Times.

“I think Zimbabwe will play their home games in South Africa, so we have a little advantage for that game.

“So, what I saw in the past, for example, Liberia played their home game in Morocco, I’m very sorry but this is not correct. I think CAF must do something about this.

“I know it is not easy for those countries to have appropriate stadiums because it is something about money, but you can easily say, ‘in five years, if you don’t have a stadium, then you don’t play CAF games anymore, you don’t play AFCON qualifiers and that of the World Cup’.

“But if you say nothing and those things happen, then the competition is not 100% correct anymore. It is not up to us, but it is the guys up there who have decided this and I hope one day they will decide by putting a period to say, ‘Okay, if you have not decided on the stadium that you need to have, I’m very sorry, you had those three or four or five years, finished, no qualifiers anymore – no for World Cup or AFCON’. Maybe then, they will do something.”

21/11/2023

2 minutes read