“WE’RE cruising nicely” once remarked a well known party leader.
Nicely we did, following SA’s under 20 national team better known as ‘Amajita’ victory last night against the stubborn Morocco side 1-0, in the Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) finals for the first time.
Midfielder star, Gomolemo Kekana fired home a beautiful goal in the 70th minute following a long ranger pass from Man of the Match goalkeeper Fletcher Lowe.
Talk of Lowe, he pulled brilliant saves to keep his side in the game, as Morocco kept pilling pressure from the first whistle. Yes, Kekana did what former Downs’ striker Hlompho Kekana used to do, unleashing such identical blistering shots.
The third official almost denied Amajita a legit goal from Kekana, forcing VAR to apply its discretion.
Amajita and Morocco found themselves in the repeat of the 1997 Afcon final, where Morocco narrowly beat the South African 1-0, however, none of the players who rewrote history on Sunday were born yet when the two nations faced off against each other 28 years ago.
What a sweet revenge!
Raymond Mdaka, under 20 coach, did allude his boys were capable of re-writing the history books and cause an upset.
“For us, reaching the final it was out of effort. For Morocco to reach the final it was out of effort. Well, we will re-write the history but we would also like to turn around the tables and see how best we have developed as a country because, you can see in between there was a bit of a slump in South Africa in terms of the junior teams; but we have picked up like my goalkeeper said.
You see the Under-17’s have qualified, the Under-20’s have qualified. It looks like we are getting there,” says Mdaka.
The boys saw off Democratic Republic of Congo in the quarterfinals and Nigeria in the semifinals.
As Africa’s champs- the boys have booked a place in the U20 FIFA World Cup in Chile later this year. Yes, we’re cruising nicely since last week SA athletes brought back three gold and one bronze medals from the China World Athletics Games, and another gold last night.
SAFA and its partner HONOR, hosted viewing at the packed Southern Sun Hotel, Sandton on Sunday evening, that had Banyana Banyana coach, Dr Desiree Ellis in attendance.
