Menzi Magubane
Themba Zwane scored twice in his long-awaited return to the Bafana Bafana set up, as the side came out 4-0 winners against Sierra Leone on Saturday.
There will be harder tests to come for Hugo Broos’s side, but their performance on home turf at the FNB Stadium in Soweto was dominant.
Indeed, no onlooker would have guessed that this Bafana side had failed to score against Sierra Leone in all four of their previous encounters.
Zwane opened the scoring before Mark Mayambela got the second of the game. Zwane got the third before Aubrey Modiba capped off the scoring.
Despite running riot in front of Sierra Leone’s goal, Broos was not overjoyed by the victory.
“I believe in it. But it was not enough,” Broos said after the match.
In his first appearance for the national side since last year, 32-year-old Zwane doubled his career tally for Bafana.
“Themba is good. I knew he was good for a while. He was a missing link in my development team,” said Broos after the match.
However, the coach had not always sung the midfielder’s praises. He had previously said that he would not be calling on him as he was building a “new” Bafana team. The veteran may have done enough in this performance to win his manager’s trust over some of the side’s youngsters.
Broos warned Zwane not too take too much from the star’s impressive performance.
“This is not France, not Morocco, but he did good. I told my players that this is new but I do expect more from here.”
Still, he conceded that Zwane’s performance will set a good example to the team’s younger players.
“Zwane gave us something different and there’s a lot for the young to learn from him.”
Bafana’s next challenge will be against Botswana, who they face at 3pm on Tuesday.
Image source: @Ndobe_Bibow
