South Africa National Team Head Coach, Hugo Broos believed his side deserved to be in the final of the 2023 AFCON and not Nigeria after their impressive run.
South Africa was eliminated from the AFCON on Wednesday by the Super Eagles of Nigeria on penalties.
Kelechi Iheanacho converted the winning penalty as Nigeria held their nerve for a 4-2 shootout win over South Africa to reach the AFCON final. William Troos,t-Ekmisseds spot-kick in normal time had looked like sending the Super Eagles through without further stress, particularly when Victor Osimhen turned the ball home with five minutes remaining.
That goal though was chalked off, and South Africa awarded a penalty of their own for a foul in the build-up. Teboho Mokoena converted to force extra time, and penalties followed.
Broos reacting to his defeat said “Football can be hard. When you see the performance of my team against Nigeria, we lost on penalties and because of that, we missed out on the final. It is hard to accept but we played a very good game and I think we were the best team in the first half,” Broos said.
“We had the best chances and Nigeria didn’t have one chance in that first half, nothing. They had a few chances in the second half but it was because we changed a few things tactically and two minutes before the end of the 90 minutes we had three chances.
“If we scored there, it meant we would go to the final. But that can happen in football and it is a big disappointment for everyone because we felt that we played a good game.
“It is a defeat, we played a bad game against Cape Verde and won on penalties and against Nigeria we played a good game and we lost on penalties. That is also football, but again we have to think about the way we played this Afcon.