Panama games showed Bafana need more matches, Broos says there can be only one

Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos has explained why Mexico’s high altitude means they can’t play more than one friendly in the final weeks before this year’s World Cup, which that country will co-host with the US and Canada.

Bafana lost 2-1 against Panama in their second friendly against the Central American side at Cape Town Stadium on Tuesday, having played to a 1-1 draw in Durban four days earlier.

Bafana used the Panama friendlies to prepare for their World Cup opener against Mexico, who, like Panama, are a Concacaf side, in Mexico City. The June 11 opener between Mexico and Bafana Bafana will be a repeat of the 2010 showpiece opener in Johannesburg.

This month’s clashes seemed to show Bafana could do with more warm-ups against tough opposition to approach a World Cup level.

Broos identified how in the second half, Panama “had more power in their team, more speed” to muscle past Bafana.

“There has to be another friendly,” Broos said in his post-match SABC interview.

“That is for sure in June. At the moment we don’t know which team or what country.

“On the other side I’d like to play maybe against a European team or maybe an Asian team.”

However, the Bafana coach explained why Mexico City’s high altitude and a short turnaround from the end of the 2025-2026 Premier Soccer League season force South Africa to settle for just one friendly before the global showpiece.

“I’ve said it already that we have a problem with the preparations because we have to go to a high altitude. The South African league finishes on May 23, and players will be released on May 25, and we need 10 days at high altitude to be ready to adapt at 2,300m in Mexico City,” Broos said.

“So that’s a problem. We can’t play so many games. How can you ask us to play a game when you have to go to high altitudes? We’re not ready to play there, and there’s no team that wants to come [to] 2,300m to play a game.

“So, we will have one game, that’s for sure, and we will have to do it with that. It can be a European or Asian team; we will see in the next weeks.”

South Africa is set to depart for Mexico in late May.

Mbekezeli Mbokazi’s 64th-minute screamer cancelled out Jose Cordoba’s 58th-minute opener at a buzzing Cape Town Stadium. Jiovany Ramos scored the visitors’ winner in the 77th.

Bafana meet Mexico in Mexico City on June 11 (9pm SA time), Czechia in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 18 (6pm), and South Korea in Guadalupe, Mexico, on June 25 (3am June 26 SA time) in their three group games.

Sowetan