Johannesburg — Banyana Banyana coach Desiree Ellis says preparing against minnows for the upcoming Fifa Women’s World Cup will help them fine-tune their plans.
After winning their first ever Wafcon to qualify for the World Cup, which will be held in New Zealand and Australia between July and August, Banyana started with their preparations last year.
Ellis’ troops were hammered 9-0 on aggregate by South American champions Brazil at home, before losing 4-1 to the event co-hosts Australia at a neutral London, England.
Since those defeats against fellow World Cup-bound teams, Banyana have changed their preparations routine, playing in the Turkish Cup against non-World Cup participants Uzbekistan and Slovenia.
So granted that they won and drew the matches respectively, Banyana were expected to test themselves against the best heading closer to the finals.
Instead, they lowered the standards of their opposition, securing themselves a friendly against the 35th-ranked Serbia on April 10. Serbia also failed to qualify for the World Cup.
“We’ve taken a different approach to 2019,” said Ellis, who was speaking at the SABC studios yesterday after announcing her 23 final squad that will face Serbia away from home.
“In 2019, we played very high-profile national teams. And when we tried to put together what we were trying to play, we couldn’t because they are a push beyond that.
“We are looking for resistance but to also get our plan in place. It’s all about getting that place. So when we are playing teams that are giving us enough resistance to do what we want, that will give us confidence.”
Having hardly put up a fight against Brazil and Australia, Ellis argues that they didn’t take anything from the games as they had to play to the strength of the opposition.
“We also need to build confidence. We played Brazil and Australia and lost heavily to Brazil. We need to gain confidence and give them a little bit of resistance to put our plan in place,” Ellis said.
“If we can put our plan in place with that little bit of resistance, that will give us confidence. On the other hand, we are working on the conditioning side of things together.”
Bafana will make their second successive appearance in the global showpiece, hoping to improve for lost time having exited in the group stage in their maiden event in 2019.
And with their opponents in Group G, Sweden Italy and Argentina – ranked second, 16th and 28th in the world respectively – Banyana can’t afford to head to the World Cup without a plan.
“So (we are) coupling those things together to make sure that when we get to the World Cup we have this plan and everybody knows what is happening,” Ellis said.
“When you play a higher-level team, you don’t put that plan in place and don’t see that. So we’ve sort of taken a different approach but we’ve tried to get some better-ranked teams.
“But unfortunately, a lot of the teams have had plans already. And that was very difficult for us.”
Serbia might not be heading to the World Cup, but they’ll still give the South Africans a run for their money given they have a similar style of play to Sweden.
And with the Swedes their first opponents in the group stage, Banyana would put themselves in a very favourable position in the group if they get a result from that game.
“They are very physical and technically good. But also very quick (something) that will challenge our defence, which is what we want,” Ellis explained.
“They have a lot of wing-play and combination play. And that’s what we want because we know it’s going to be similar (situation) against Sweden with the wing play, height up front and defence.”
IOL Sport