Banyana Banyana coach Desiree Ellis has graciously accepted her team's fate after they finished fourth at the Women's Africa Cup of Nations (Wafcon) after a penalty shoot-out defeat to Ghana at the Larbi Zaouli Stadium in Casablanca on Friday night.
The defending champions lost 4-3 on penalties against the Black Queens, a team Ellis' charges had defeated 2-0 in their opening Group C match earlier in July.
Banyana looked to be cruising to yet another victory when they took the lead through Nonhlanhla Mthanti on the stroke of halftime but poor defending after the restart got Ghana back into the match after they equalised through Alice Kusi in the 68th minute.
Ellis lamented her team's slow start and failure to control the game in the early stages as one of the reasons that gave the Ghanaians confidence, especially in the second half in which they cancelled Mthanti's goal.
“We started very slowly, got into the game and got a goal when we pressed,” Ellis explained after Friday's match.
“But they came out guns blazing for most of the second half, especially that first 15 minutes. We couldn’t get our foot on the ball to slow the game down, and to take control.
“They were just better than us in the second half and eventually going to penalties, we always knew that we had a chance. Unfortunately, we didn’t win the penalty shoot-out this time around, so congratulations to Ghana. We live on, and we’ll then start preparing for what’s forward,” said Ellis.
The next mission for Banyana will be to qualify for next year's Wafcon which will be also hosted by Morocco for the record third successive time. That Wafcon will also serve as qualifier for the 2027 Women's Fifa World Cup which will be hosted by Brazil.
Banyana did make strides in the last World Cup in New Zealand and Australia as they managed to make it to the knockout stages for the first time.
Ellis highlighted the tight and heavy schedule at Wafcon as having taken a toll on her players. In seven matches Banyana played in Morocco they lost two — one against Nigeria in the semifinal and against Ghana on penalties on Friday.
“I think some of the games took a lot out of us, but we always knew either getting to the final or getting to the third and fourth place playoff we still had another game. We’ve also picked up some injuries along the way, but that’s not an excuse.
“But you’ve got to give credit to the opponents. In most situations they were better than us and I not going to sugarcoat that, you’ve got to give credit where it’s due,” Ellis said.
Ellis, whose future with Banyana is not yet clear as she has no formal contract with the SA Football Association, admitted that her team did not achieve what they set to do in Morocco.
“We'll dust ourselves off and move on. We can’t look back too much. Yes, it wasn’t a great campaign, but we got into the semifinals and came very close to getting to the final, so we’ll just move on. Like every team that comes to a tournament, we had ambitions of winning it, but we didn’t get there. Unfortunately, we didn’t do well today,” said Ellis.
The match against Ghana was the last for Banyana striker Jermaine Seoposenwe who announced her retirement before the start of the tournament.
Banyana are expected to arrive back in South Africa on Monday evening.
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