Banyana not settling for a point

After losing 1-0 to the hosts in their opening match, Joseph Mkhonza's side bounced back to beat Senegal by the same margin in their second game, with Andisiwe Mgcoyi scoring the all-important goal.

The result left the South Africans in second place with three points, tied with DR Congo, who also defeated Senegal 1-0 in their opening game.

The Congolese then went on to lose 6-0 to the hosts, putting South Africa in second place with a superior goal difference.

This means that a draw will be good enough to send Banyana into the next round as the second best team in the group, but Dlamini says they are aiming to go for the kill.

"Football can be a very strange game, therefore we can't afford to judge DR Congo on their result against Equatorial Guinea," she says.

"We want to have a good run in the competition so it's important to us to continue with the attitude of wanting to win every game and set the tone going forward.

"We have to play good football and score as many goals as possible; we can't settle for a draw in our last group game."

Dlamini admits that they are not satisfied with their overall performance so far and insists that Sunday's game will be another opportunity for them to correct some of the mistakes they have made.

"As a team we were gutted after losing our opening game," she says. "We were at bit unsettled by the wet conditions but these are the things we have to be prepared for, and we still played well enough to win the game.

"Against Senegal we managed to control the game and created much more scoring chances, but we were only able to convert one.

"As a result, we've been working hard on our finishing and our decision-making in the final third."

Group B is proving to be tight race between Nigeria, Cameroon and the Ivory Coast, but Dlamini says they have not given much thought on who their next opponents will be should they progress to the semi-finals.

"We're not really concentrating on the other group at this stage because we're focused on our stream and the immediate hurdle that we have to overcome to go through to the knockout stage," said Dlamini.

"Our aim is to keep improving so we can be ready for any opponent. We came here to take on the best teams in Africa and that's what we're looking forward to."

Junior Mpisane/BackpageTxt