15 July 2018– Burger-King sponsored South Africa’s national Under-20 (Amajita) played to a 0-0 draw in the first leg third round 2019 Africa U-20 Cup of Nations qualifier clash against Malawi on Sunday at Moruleng Stadium.
Coach Thabo Senong made no changes to his line-up which played to a 3-3 draw against Zambia in a friendly clash leading up to this encounter.
In the first stanza of the match, Amajita took full charge of the game and by taking the fight into their opponent’s half. That saw the home side creating a decent number of scoring chances, only to miss the goal mouth by inches. Amajita would have been at least three goals up before the halftime break had it not been the lack of luck which saw the likes of Lyle Foster, Promise Mkhuma and Siphesihle Mkhize miss the goal mouth by a whisker each.
In defence, the national juniors were just superb. The visitors struggled massively to create decent scoring chances, and when the slipped through, they weren’t sharp enough to finish them off. Amajita’s solid performance in the rearguard was a result of good communication led by centre-back, Givemore Khupe, going into midfield, and then final third. The likes of Kobamelo Kodisang, Wiseman Meyiwa and Mkhize were also called upon to drop in deep whenever it was South Africa’s turn to defend.
That performance carried on into the second half of the game. Senong made two substitutions which saw the both Duncan Adonis and Kodisang make way for Nkosingiphile Ngcobo and Khanyisile Mayo in the 65thminute respectively, to help South Africa’s aggression in attack.
With these two fresh legs, Amajita continued to huff and puff up in the final third, however, it was not to be as Malawi continued hold on for dear life up until fulltime.