South Africans are ready to celebrate their first World Cup qualification since hosting the Mundial in 2010, but the Bafana Bafana must be prepared for a bruising game against Nigeria, attacking midfielder, Mohau Nkota, has warned.
According to businesslive.co.za, Nkota, at the weekend, appealed to his teammates to get all three points when they take on Nigeria in arguably both teams’ biggest match of the 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifying campaign at Free State Stadium in Bloemfontein tomorrow.
Bafana, who beat Lesotho 3-0 at Free State Stadium on Friday, go into the clash on top of Group C with 16 points from seven matches and have momentum after four successive wins over “Likuena” (twice), Benin and Zimbabwe.
Benin are in second spot with 11 points, closely followed by the Super Eagles (10), who refreshed their ambitions with a hard-fought 1-0 win over Rwanda on Saturday night.
Nigeria arrive in the country highly motivated, knowing a win in Bloemfontein will bring them within three points of Bafana. The Super Eagles’ prospects of reaching the first 48-team World Cup in Mexico, Canada and the US rest on beating Bafana, who are in line to have three points docked for fielding ineligible Teboho Mokoena in their win against Lesotho in Polokwane in March.
A win for Bafana would put them on 19 points with a major advantage, even if they have points docked, for a first World Cup qualification since 2002 other than as hosts in 2010. A draw would preserve the six-point lead over the Super Eagles and also leave SA sitting pretty.
Nkota is confident they can get a positive result against Nigeria. “We just have to continue where we left off against Lesotho. We must go all out for the three points to open the gap at the top and if we don’t get the win, we will take a draw and move on,” he said.
“We did what we had to do against Lesotho and that has got us closer to realising our dream of going to the World Cup.” Nkota opened the scoring against Lesotho. The Orlando Pirates youth product who joined Al-Ettifaq in Saudi Arabia in July is happy to contribute whenever Coach Hugo Broos calls on him.
“Whenever I am selected, I have a responsibility to go out there and do my job and that is to contribute to the team.” The other player who found the back of the net against Lesotho was Oswin Appollis.
Signed by Pirates in July, largely to cover for the loss of Nkota, the former Polokwane City winger is expecting a tough game from the motivated Super Eagles.
“It is going to be a difficult but exciting game against Nigeria because they have a lot of quality players in their squad. We are ready for the fight. It is never easy against them because they are a talented team but we will be ready on Tuesday. It’s all about teamwork — if we work together as a team we can succeed against them.”
