‘No gifts from Lesotho’ – Broos warns ahead of World Cup qualifier
Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos insists they remain humble and expect no gifts when they face Lesotho in Friday’s 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifier.
South Africa will face their neighbours, who are number 149 in the latest FIFA rankings, at the New Peter Mokaba Stadium in Polokwane.
Lesotho are only two points below Bafana Bafana in Group C of the qualifiers.
Speaking ahead of the match, which kicks off at 18:00 this evening, Broos warned against undermining the Lesotho national team, which is considered to be ‘minnows’.
“First of all, you are playing a World Cup qualifier match. I can assure you, there is nobody in the whole group that doesn’t want to go to the World Cup next year,” explained Broos.
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“As I said, we have to stay humble, and we have to know that we still have to work a lot. There will be no gifts from nobody and certainly not from Lesotho.”
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Broos also acknowledged that he faced difficulties when facing countries considered as minnows before, but believes things are different now.
“So the motivation is totally different. We are also already a level higher than if you compare it to two or three years ago. We became a good team.
“First of all, you have to see which conditions we played those games. It’s not a guarantee that we will win against Lesotho, but against Eswatini, we played with a lot of new players,” added Broos.
“It was a period where I was looking for the right players and the right team. We played against Lesotho last year just before AFCON. If you knew the work the players did the week before, you can understand that we were not that fresh to play that game.
“I remember that after the game, players were also disappointed because we played 0-0, and it was not good. But immediately I told them, don’t be afraid. Don’t start doubting [yourself]. I know why we played that game. So this is a totally different circumstance.”
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