Bafana’s Mashaba Calls Up 83 Players In A Year

Shakes Mashaba has called up 83 different players for Bafana Bafana during the first year of his current tenure, and has won more games than he’s lost.

The 3-1 defeat to Mauritania in African Cup of Nations qualification over the weekend marked exactly one year since Mashaba’s first game in charge, however the outcome was wholly different to the 3-0 win over Sudan in September 2014.

Saturday’s game was Mashaba’s 23^rd game as Bafana coach in his current stint, and the defeat was just his fifth loss and only his third defeat in normal time.

Since Mashaba took over the reigns at the South African national team Bafana have won nine games, drawn nine and lost five, though two of the five defeats were in penalty shootouts after 0-0 draws.

To put the 83 players into perspective, previous coach, Gordon Igesund, called up 55 players in his two-year spell in the job.

Meanwhile, under Mashaba’s tutelage Bafana have scored 29 goals and conceded 17, with 16 of their 29 goals scored being away from home.

However, the first half of Mashaba’s tenure was largely different to the second half, maintaining a nine-game unbeaten run between September and January before going on to win just one of the following 10 matches.

As things stand, South Africa are bottom of Group M in the AFCON qualifiers, and should they fail to beat Cameroon in their two games in March, then their chances of reaching Gabon will be cut from slim to non-existent.