It will be a straight shoot-out between the South African Under-23 team and their Tunisian counterparts for a semi-final spot in Friday’s Olympic qualifier in Senegal.
It almost cannot be any tighter in the race for a last-four place from Group A in the Eight Nations tournament, which will see the top three teams go through to the 2016 Rio Olympics as Africa’s representatives.
While host nation Senegal secured their passage to the playoffs with a 2-0 win over Tunisia on Tuesday evening, the South Africans kept alive their hopes of making it to Rio with a come-from-behind 3-2 victory over Zambia.
Orlando Pirates pair Gift Motupa (2) and Menzi Masuku were the heroes for Owen da Gama’s team by scoring the goals less than 24 hours after arriving in camp in Dakar on Monday night, as they had been on club duty in the Caf Confederation Cup final in Tunisia on Sunday.
So with Senegal already qualified from Group A, it’s down to the SA-Tunisia game on Friday (5pm SA time) to decide the second semi-finalist from the group. And they are neck-and-neck on the log – both teams have three points and a goal difference of minus one.
The South Africans are currently second by virtue of having scored more goals than Zambia (four compared to two), so a draw will ensure their qualification to the next round.
But they wouldn’t want to enter into the Tunisian game with a negative mindset, as it was an energetic start to the second half that changed the game against Zambia. They came out with a positive approach after the break while 1-0 down, and scored three goals in just nine minutes after halftime.
Captain on the day Keagan Dolly also spoke about how the long-ball tactic used in the opening defeat to Senegal – “which is not our strength” – and it was clear that they reverted to a more natural short-passing style of play using their speed across the ground that reaped dividends against Zambia.
Dolly was buzzing all over the place, mixing things up by switching from the left to the right flanks, and then also going up the middle, and he made a much greater impact in comparison to his performance in the first game.
“In terms of me moving from left to right is just me trying to create opportunities for the team to score,” he said on the Caf website after the Zambia match.
But Tunisia are likely to be as quick as the South Africans, so it will be up to Ajax Cape Town’s midfield anchorman Abbubaker Mobara to impose his physicality once more on the opposition after a stand-out display against Zambia.
Coach Da Gama said the squad will study the Senegal-Tunisia game closely to see how the host nation exposed the Tunisians’ weaknesses in the 2-0 victory.
“I think it was very important us to try and salvage a win to give us a better chance, as our first match didn’t go well,” Da Gama told the Caf website.
“We welcomed our two players back from the Caf Confederation Cup final, Gift Motupa scored two goals and created another. I still believe these are two important players for us, but we had to sacrifice them for the Confederation Cup because it’s also a Caf tournament.
“We will be watching Tunisia and Senegal to have a better understanding of their team.”
ashfak.mohamed@inl.co.za
@IndyCapeSport