On Tuesday night South Africa outclassed South Sudan with a dominant 3-0 win at the sold-out Cape Town Stadium to finish at the top of their group comfortably with a massive goal difference.

South Africa went into the game in the Mother City needing to win in order to finish at the top of the group after Uganda claimed a 2-0 away win against the Democratic Republic of Congo in Brazzaville.

From the word go Bafana took control of the game and dominated proceedings and they did not let up until the final whistle.

Bafana enjoyed a staggering 82% possession throughout the game with a pass accuracy of 93%. South Africa also had 23 shots on goal in the game, of which 10 were on target. South Sudan in turn only had three shots on goal with one being on target.

Iqraam Rayners of Mamelodi Sundowns opened the scoring in the 7th minute, while Patrick Maswanganyi of Orlando Pirates doubled the lead in the 22nd. The Bethlehem-born Teboho Mokoena of Sundown then sealed the deal with a 50th-minute penalty following a clumsy challenge in the box.

The coach Hugo Broos lauded his team for their outstanding campaign.

Patrick Maswanganyi. Photo: X

“I’m proud, not only for the performance but also for the mentality this team showed during all 90 minutes of the game,” said Broos.

“During the pre-match meeting, I showed the players a few results of teams who were already qualified but lost their games. Tunisia, Nigeria, and Burkina Faso all lost their last games and I asked the players not to spoil the party today.

“That shows again the mentality that we have in the team and that the guys are hungry. The guys knew that they had a responsibility as there was a big crowd and they couldn’t disappoint them. They did it from the first minute. We played good football, there was a high tempo, we had chances during the whole game.

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“I think we made the people happy and this is something that is very important too, so we are winning more and more supporters. It’s a big difference from two years ago when there were two thousand or five thousand people coming to see our games.  The people are coming because when they come to the stadium, they see something and this is what we always wanted to do and now we are able to do it because we have a good team.

“So, the fact that this team still played 90 minutes for 100 percent to be first in the group, I think this is the right mentality that they showed, and I’m very proud of this team and to be their coach.”

South Africa scored 16 goals in the qualifying which is by far the joint-most along with Algeria. In addition, Bafana only conceded five goals in the unbeaten campaign which produced four wins and two draws.

OFM Sport/Morgan Piek mvh