Banyana Banyana struggling to assemble a COSAFA Women’s Champs squad

The South African women’s senior national team, the most successful senior women’s national team in the region with seven titles, are scheduled to open their tournament against Malawi in a Group A encounter at the Lucas Moripe Stadium in Atteridgeville on Wednesday afternoon (15:00).

The tournament will run from 06 to 15 October in Gauteng, with matches taking place in Atteridgeville and UJ Stadium and Dobsonville Stadium in Soweto.

SABC Sport has learnt that Banyana head coach Desiree Ellis, who is fresh from leading the team to the FIFA Women’s World Cup knockout stages and also playing four-time World Cup champions USA in back-to-back international friendlies two weeks ago, is frustrated by the latest happenings.

 It’s also alleged that the team only had their first training session today with less than 15 players in camp.

It’s believed that Hollywoodbets Super League clubs have been refusing to release players because the league’s programme has not been suspended for the duration of this tournament.

 Like it happened just before the World Cup warm-up qualifier against Botswana, Ellis and her technical team are now trying to put together a makeshift squad made up of available players including players from the SASOL provincial leagues. With the SASOL national play-offs kicking off from 16-22 October in Bloemfontein, it also means that players from the provincial winners might not be available for selection.

With the South African U20 national women’s team also in camp for the FIFA World Cup qualifiers, as they play Burundi in Dobsonville stadium this weekend, some of the emerging talent can’t even plug the gaps in the makeshift squad.

SABC Sport spoke to a few coaches in the HWBSL on condition of anonymity as they did not want to go on the record because they are not authorized to, and they have questioned why SAFA could not suspend the league’s programme to accommodate the COSAFA Women’s champ’s programme.

“Our hands are tied, the league’s programme is still on and there are crucial matches that are being played. Some teams are battling for the top spot and others trying to avoid relegation.

“There is also the rule that a club that has three players selected can postpone its fixture, but we don’t know if it is active or silent in this tournament, since it also falls outside the international week,” commented one of the HWBSL coaches.

SAFA, who are said to have missed three deadlines for squad submission to the tournament organizers, had not responded to our inquiries about these developments at the time of publishing this article.