South Africa senior women’s national team head coach Desiree Ellis has said her players must be at their absolute best to overcome Nigeria’s Super Falcons in the Paris 2024 Olympic playoffs.
The WAFCON champions will face the Falcons in a highly anticipated fourth round CAF Women’s Olympic qualifier next month.
The winner over two legs will compete in Group C at the Paris Games.
Banyana will travel to Abuja for the first leg billed for 5 April before welcoming the nine-time African champions at Loftus Versfeld in Pretoria on 9 April 2024.
Banyana Banyana assembled for camp in Pretoria on Monday afternoon (25 March 2024) and their first official training session was on Tuesday.
Looking forward to the qualifiers, Ellis was impressed by what she saw after the first official training session.
“We still have a couple of days before the final squad announcement, so I have to make sure that I get the combinations right.
“I have to make absolutely sure because it won’t be an easy game against Nigeria. They have shown their quality over a period of time and they are still a quality team, so we have to be at our absolute best.
“We have to make sure that we get the combinations right as well as the mix of youth and experience right.”
The Falcons would be hoping to make a first Olympic appearance since the 2008 Beijing games.
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COMMENTS
Deborah Abiodun and Echiejini in the midfield gives us a ray of hope.We have a big reliable goalkeeper too,it wont be business as usual for South Africa.
Our opponent is a dangerous side,we have to take our chances if we are serious to go to the Olympics.I love Deborah Abiodun,she’s a midfield dynamo,it will be a midfield tussle,in the past we lost the battle in the midfield leading to successive loses to South Africa,but with the emergence of Deborah Abiodun,the Pittsburg university ace,it’s looking good for the falcons because what she brings to the team is huge.I am also banking on Echiejini to bring her creativity to bear,i like her forward penetration and killer instincts.
These two players have strengthen the falcons,South Africa will meet a much better super falcons,it won’t be business as usual!
Well, it’ll be a difficult game but if we could close down the South Africans’ midfield and stop them from pressing high, then victory would be ours. We need to win well here in Nigeria first and then go to South Africa to play negative football with counter attacks.
For the past few days, Ellis has enjoyed been in the news. Is it that she’s worried or scared her girls might lose the game or it’s just her nature.
Nigeria has a lot of work to do to qualify for the Olympics. South Africa must fall.