Mosimane outlines bold plan to face stronger opposition and boost Bafana’s FIFA rankings

 In the recent international week, from last month to the first week of this month, Bafana Bafana played two Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) qualifiers against Guinea and Eritrea. They rounded off their programme against Egypt, who were ranked third on the continent and 25th globally at the time. The plus side of this was to see Bafana breaking into the top 48 on the global rankings, a method Mosimane wants to continue using.

" Yes, it's humbling. Of course, we have to acknowledge the team where I found it, to be honest. Okay, the bit we contributed adds to that because if you win against Egypt, you win more points. If you beat Guinea, you get more points than Eritrea, so yes, we are working towards that," said Mosimane

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"The most important thing is to play strategically. Friendlies must be strategic, and sometimes, well, I tried to do that before, and you know what happened to me. That's the challenge; I am that coach who falls on his sword to say, look, we could've played anybody we wanted, but we played Egypt, and we got more points, right? Now we are 48th. Imagine if we didn't play Egypt and played somebody ranked even below us, and we didn't even win. You're gambling with the points."

As things stand, Bafana are ranked 10th on the continent, and judging by the current pots, when the draw is done for next year’s AFCON in the PAMOJA region, they will be in Pot 3 and won’t avoid most of the big guns. But if they continue to move up in the rankings and be in the top eight or at least top seven or six, they will be in Pot 3, making Mosimane’s point about the choice of opposition stronger.

Last month’s international week was the latest version of the international calendar that FIFA was introducing, which lasted 16 days instead of the usual 14 days. Teams were allowed to play up to four matches instead of two, but Mosimane says they opted for three, two official matches and an international friendly.

With an MTN8 final between Orlando Pirates and Mamelodi Sundowns lined up for the following weekend after the international friendly match against a full-strength Egyptian national team ranked fifth in Africa, Mosimane also explained reasons for choosing to go with only three games.