Staff Reporter.
South Africa Under-23 side made life difficult for themselves after playing to a 1-1 draw with Congo Brazzaville in the first leg of the Caf Olympic qualifiers at Dobsonville Stadium on Thursday.
South Africa will now have the tall order of needing to score at least one goal to have any chance of qualifying for the Olympics, having conceded an away goal.
It was the visitors who broke the deadlock in a highly contested first round of play through attacker Bissila Mabiala, the big man capitalising on poor position by the home side’s defence in the 43rd minute.
The Congolese put together a couple of decent passes in the middle of the park before a ball outside saw a quality cross played on the blind side of Olwethu Makhanya at centre back and Mabiala capitalised, heading into the bottom corner.
Thapelo Maseko, who had been South Africa’s best player on the day, found the all-important equalising goal, assisted by second-half substitute Mduduzi Shabalala in the 69th minute.
Shabalala added the creative bone the hosts had been missing in the first stanza and beautifully found a running Maseko in the box, throwing the game back on a knife edge.
AmaGlug-glug coach David Notoane named a strong and extremely attacking starting eleven comprising the likes of red-hot Cape Town Spurs striker Ashley Cupido with Maseko and Stellenbosch’s Devin Titus on either side of him in a 4-3-3 formation.
South Africa will now travel to Brazzaville to play the second leg at Massamba-Debat Stadium on March 27.