South Africa U23 head coach David Notoane says he’s emotionally drained after failing to take the national U23 side to the Africa Cup Of Nations.
The Young Bafana side weren’t able to overturn their 1-1 draw with Congo Brazzaville from a few days ago, collecting a 0-0 in the second leg in Brazzaville to miss out on away goals.
A bitterly disappointed Notoane shared some insight into the match, which wasn’t televised, saying Boitumelo Radiopane and Mduduzi Shabalala missed the best chances for his side.
“A Very, very difficult result and outcome, which we didn’t deserve but it’s football,” he told SAFA’s media team.
“[I’m] very very disappointed on a personal level because I think the game was within our grasp to get a result. We had planned to make sure that defensively we are tight, which we didn’t concede was very good.
“But then we missed some very very good chances, Radiopane had two one-vs-ones, then at the end Mduduzi Shabalala had a breakthrough on transition play on the platter to finish unfortunately again it’s all down to decision-making.
“[I’m] very, very disappointed but I think again the boys put up a very galant fight under very difficult conditions and we’re going out on an away-goal rule unfortunately and it’s football. It wasn’t our time.
“But it’s emotionally very much draining, if one looks at the circumstances overall in terms of our campaign and it leaves one with a lot more questions and a lot more soul searching about the process that we on in regard to this team.”
Congo Brazzaville will now head to the U23 AFCON, where the top three sides qualify for the 2024 Olympics in Paris next year.
