Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos singled Man of the Match Ronwen Williams for praise after the goalkeeper’s four penalty saves against Cape Verde fired the team into the semifinals of the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON).
Broos also lamented the team’s display, labeling it the ‘worst game of the tournament’.
Williams produced a performance for the ages in the 2-1 penalty shootout win, making four key saves.
Bafana qualified to the semi-finals of AFCON for the first time in 24 years, denying Cape Verde the opportunity to create the same milestone of reaching the last four.
“Let’s say six hours ago I was 71, now I’m 75,” Broos said after the match.
“It was a stressful game, certainly the penalties. You know what happens when you have to take penalties, it’s a very special situation for the players.
“Sometimes you do a little game after training, taking penalties and nearly no player misses a penalty but you see today what happened, not only with us but also the players from Cape Verde.
“That means, we can be happy, but players want to get a penalty. We were, not lucky because we had a very good keeper today. If you can save four penalties, this is not luck anymore. You can save one, but four, this is not luck.
“He did not only that, he saved us two minutes before the end with a player that was alone infront of him. Yes, he was of the match. I think we could choose nobody else, because he is really Man of the Match,” said Broos as quoted by IDiski Times.
The Sundowns goalie also kept his fourth clean sheet of the tournament, thus matching Andre Arendse’s record of 1996.
Broos lamented the team’s display, arguing that a few players may have struggled with the pressure.
“Our match was not so good, I think we played the worst game of the tournament of all our games. We played better against Mali, we played better against Namibia, Tunisia, also Morocco,” he added.
Ronwen Williams has become the first goalkeeper to ever save 4 penalties in a single TotalEnergies AFCON shootout. 🤯🇿🇦#TotalEnergiesAFCON2023
— Total Energies AFCON (@TotalAFCON2023) February 4, 2024
“Today, this was not the team we saw in the previous week. I think for some players it’s a very new experience, and maybe the pressure and the nerves played a role today in the game.
“For Cape Verde it was maybe different, they had nothing to lose. Even I think they are very sad now, but for us there was more to lose. And that was in the heads of the players and therefor we didn’t play like we used to do.
“But ok, I said it already it’s not the way you win [that matters], it’s you win and we won today with penalties. So we are very happy.”
Bafana are due to face long-time rivals Nigeria in the semifinals.
