Cape Verde's preparations for Bafana rocked by injury and withdrawals

Cape Verde have been hit by injury and withdrawals as they battle to get their preparations underway for Friday’s World Cup qualifier at home to South Africa in Praia.

But their key midfielder Babanco has promised home fans a return to winning ways and dismissed suggestions that all is not well in side in the island nation’s national team squad as they prepare to take on Bafana Bafana.

“The time has come to turn around our situation and start winning the games again‚” he told reporters on Wednesday.

The Cape Verde have lost both opening qualifiers in Group D and suffered a blow with the withdrawal‚ in the last 24 hours‚ of three players from the original squad of 23 players.

Teenage striker Jovane Cabral from Sporting Lisbon has pulled out of the squad for undisclosed personal reasons while experienced defenders Ricardo Silva‚ 37‚ and Fernando Varela‚ 29‚ are injured and also miss out.

Silva is from Pacos Ferreira in Portugal’s top flight while Varela plays for Greek outfit PAOK Salonika.

Only 12 squad members were present on Tuesday at the first training session for the team ahead of Friday’s match‚ plus the return game against Bafana in Durban next Tuesday.

But on Wednesday only three selected players still had to show up – Dutch-based defender Steve Pereira‚ midfielder Ponck from newly promoted Desportivo Aves in Portugal and Platini‚ who plays in Romania and was in the line-up that took on South Africa in the opening game of the 2013 African Nations Cup finals.

Babanco also played in the goalless draw at Soccer City and on Wednesday sounded a confident note: "South Africa is a very strong team‚ but through our work and dedication we have been demonstrating that we will achieve our goals."

He added that the Cape Verde could afford no room for error and denied any off-field issues‚ assuring the players were focused on training and appealing to fans to attend "in bulk”.

 - TimesLIVE