Due to a miscommunication in the administration, Bafana Bafana were unable to participate in their first training session at the Dobsonville Stadium, which put a major damper on their preparations for their forthcoming friendly.
Two friendly games will be held at the South African national in the next week. As head coach Hugo Broos intensifies preparations for the resumption of AFCON qualifiers, the first match will be on Saturday against Sierra Leone, followed by Botswana on the following Tuesday.
Coach Broos, who is trying to integrate the new faces with his core, was reportedly visibly angry at having to cancel a crucial training session, according to Timeslive.
“I had no idea that we couldn’t train today on the field. As SA conducted a news conference at Dobsonville Stadium on Monday, Broos said, “If you ask me where we are going to train, I can’t tell you since we didn’t do it (Bafana did not get the arrangements incorrect).
Bafana’s inability to train was caused by an error on the part of Stadium Management SA (SMSA), the managing director Bertie Grobbelaar revealed to Timeslive. The Dobsonville Stadium was not equipped for the national team since they forgot to reserve it.
Grobbelaar said that there was no scheduled training session for yesterday (Monday).
“I notice that there was a [media] story that the pitch was flawed. The pitch was in perfect condition. The stadium had no reservations.
“Safa asked for a news conference yesterday at 3pm quite late, and I agreed. At 1:00 pm, a request for the news conference was made. But since the practise was today (Tuesday), the field wasn’t designated, according to Grobbelaar.