Igesund unfazed by disruptions to his plans

Bafana Bafana head coach Gordon Igesund said on Wednesday he was still very much upbeat despite travelling disruptions that saw the team staying overnight in Douala after failing to get the scheduled connecting flight to Yaoundé yesterday (Tuesday).

Bafana Bafana’s plans were thrown into disarray on Tuesday after their connecting flight to Yaoundé was unexpectedly cancelled and had to alter their plans after they could not proceed to their base camp.

This means the national team can only fully train twice – tomorrow (Thursday) and Friday – before the crunch match on Saturday against Central African Republic (CAR).

“Ideally, I would have liked to be on the training field today (Wednesday) but there is nothing we can do, we have to make the best of the situation. The boys will have a light session in the pool as there is no time to arrange a training pitch.

“Of course, the swimming pool activity was not part of the plan but we have to keep the players busy. That leaves us with two days of training and I cannot blame anybody. These things happen but it would be quite interesting to know what exactly happened,” said Igesund.

“The good thing is that before we left, I told the players to be mentally strong and expect such disruptions. But we should not take it to head; we must just continue to be strong and know what task lies ahead. If it was not for team manager Barney Kujane leaving ahead of the team, we would have found ourselves totally stranded.”

The Bafana Bafana mentor believes the Lesotho international match, which Bafana won 2-0, in the bigger scheme of things, has become an important factor.

“Following that match, we now know what we have to do, and we will do the best we can in the remaining two days. It is a setback that we cannot fit in a third training session but it is not a train-smash. The boys are professionals, and being at the end of the season their fitness levels are very high. Now it becomes even more important that we played the Lesotho match because it gives us a lot of ideas on areas to work on,” added Igesund.

The team will have their first training session in Yaoundé on Thursday afternoon (6 June).