Coach Mdaka critical of Amajita’s play after thrashing Botswana

South Africa Under-20 coach Raymond Mdaka was still critical of his troops' overall application on the day despite a 6-0 thrashing of neighbours Botswana in a friendly at Soweto UJ Campus Stadium on Saturday.

Cape Town City's Jody Ah Shene and Mfundo Vilakazi of Kaizer Chiefs each scored twice, while Langelihle Phili of Stellenbosch and Ah Shene's club teammate, Shakeel April, were also on target.

The two teams will meet again in another friendly at the same venue on Tuesday as Amajita continue to prepare for the U-20 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) to be staged in Ivory Coast from April 26 to May 18.

“Not that much [of a good game]. Maybe we played to the strengths of the opponent. The way I know our team, we should have done much better,” Mdaka said.

“I think it went to the players' minds to say, 'Botswana won't pose much challenge', which is something we shouldn't be doing because we're preparing [for Afcon].

“Sometimes it's fine because we score goals, but we need to apply ourselves seriously because we're going to face challenges if we don't do that going forward. We need to do away with the mindset of taking opponents lightly. We must do the right things all the time.”

Amajita are in group B of the junior Afcon, which is seen as the group of death because it has Nigeria, Egypt and Morocco. The four teams that reach the semifinals will automatically qualify for the U-20 World Cup, to be hosted by Chile from September 27 to October 19.

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